


White Blood

by whitelove



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Abuse, Aged-Up Character(s), Angst, F/F, Fluff, Implied Sexual Content, M/M, Original Universe, Self-Harm, Smut, Suicide Attempt, There's also a lesbian counsellor, Tsukishima is sad, Yamaguchi has a massive crush on Tsukki
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-05-08
Updated: 2017-10-11
Packaged: 2018-06-07 03:14:15
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 8
Words: 22,495
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6783001
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/whitelove/pseuds/whitelove
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Kei comes out as gay at school when he starts being harassed. Meanwhile, Yamaguchi struggles with his sexuality and his crush on Kei as he begins experimenting sexually with Hinata. As the harassment continues, Kei starts to push more and more people away from him, and Yamaguchi realises just how in love with Kei he is.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Livewire

**Author's Note:**

> hey!! this is my first proper fanfic i'm posting here. hopefully will be writing more/some one-shots in the future!
> 
> each chapter is named after a different oh wonder song, you can listen to them all here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nXQ_9nTI5UE
> 
> thank u for reading, i hope u enjoy ((:

“Tsukkkkiiiiiiiii!”

Yamaguchi’s voice filled the quiet house as he ran through the door and up the stairs to Kei’s bedroom, throwing open the door to reveal a confused Kei, still wearing his pyjamas.

“What is it?” Kei groaned, slowly rolling out of bed, blindly reaching around on his desk for his glasses.

“The cherry blossoms!!” Yamaguchi exclaimed, running around Kei’s room.

Kei’s room was an organised mess. At first glance, it seems like a complete mess, clothes strewn across the floor, unimportant papers spread across Kei’s desk. But after you had gotten to know where things went – after 10 years of being friends with Kei, he had finally gotten the hang of it – the room seems to make complete sense.

“Quick, quick, Tsukki! Get dressed, Tsukki!! We’re gonna see the cherry blossoms!!” Yamaguchi sang, grabbing Kei’s hand after he had finished dressing and dragging him down the stairs to the door. Yamaguchi ran through the house, Kei right behind him, struggling to keep up. Despite Kei’s long legs, Yamaguchi was always faster. Yamaguchi threw the door open and dashed through it out into the crisp spring air.

Kei looked out across the park neighbouring his house. This park had once been the home of him and Yamaguchi when they were children – it would take hours for their parents to drag them out of that park and back home. The park was filled with cherry blossom trees, play equipment and walking trails, and it stretched from Kei’s house to the school. Kei and Yamaguchi loved to walk through the park and admire the trees on their way to school, however as time went on they had started to become bored of the same trees over and over again. Today was different, however, as the trees were now littered with beautiful white flowers strung across all their branches.

Yamaguchi let go of Kei’s arm and darted off, running to the closest pile of petals and kicking it, causing flowers to fly everywhere. Kei slowly walked after him, laughing about how much of an idiot Yamaguchi was. Kei slowly bent down and picked up a flower off the ground. He admired their colours – the white petals contrasted beautifully with the pink stems. Kei noticed the gentle breeze drifting through the park which was causing more fragile flowers to fall off the trees, creating a gentle rain of flowers as they drifted to the ground.

Yamaguchi ran back to Kei, his hands filled with flowers.

“Stand still, Tsukki~!” Yamaguchi sang, delicately picking up flowers from his hand and placing them in Kei’s hair. The two of them were only about a foot away, and Kei could see every feature on Yamaguchi’s face. His face was dotted with freckles which made him the subject of teasing in primary school, however Yamaguchi had come to embrace them as they made him unique. Kei was glad he had. He looked way cuter with freckles.

After playing with his hair for 5 minutes, Yamaguchi stepped back and admired his creation. Kei had a row of flowers lined up in his hair like a flower crown.

“You look so _cute_ , Tsukki!!” Yamaguchi exclaimed, laughing and squeezing his cheeks. Kei hated it when people squeezed his cheeks. His grandma would do it every time he visited her in the nursing home, and joke about how tall he’d grown. He hated people calling him tall, too.

After making Kei’s flower crown the duo headed off to school for morning practise, Yamaguchi laughing and getting excited about the flowers as they slowly trod along the path to school. Kei noticed that Yamaguchi was brighter this morning – he normally perked up whenever the flowers are in blossom.

“-He pulled out a _Hyper Potion_ on me, Tsukki!” Yamaguchi sighed. “How was I meant to beat him?”

“Pull out a hyper potion on him,” Kei laughed.

“Are you even listening to me?” Yamaguchi sighed, “I told you, I’d already ran out!”

Admittedly, Kei had zoned out. Kei often zoned out during conversations to admire trees or the clouds or think about other things. His mind wandered constantly and he struggled focusing on long conversations. This was partly the reason why everyone had pushed him away whilst he was at Junior High. Except Yamaguchi. Yamaguchi still stuck by Kei for some reason.

Eventually the duo arrived at the gym for morning training, Kei’s flower crown still intact thanks to Yamaguchi constantly fixing it on their way there. As they walked into the gym, they were attacked by a particular short individual.

“Tsukishima, you look so cute!” Hinata squealed, jumping over to Yamaguchi and Kei as they entered the gym.

Kei grumbled and rolled his eyes as Yamaguchi and Hinata laugh about Kei, joking about how cute he looks with flowers. After laughing for a bit, a tall black-haired boy appeared to see what was so funny.

“It’s certainly an improvement,” Kageyama said unenthusiastically. Kei looked up at Kageyama to see his own hair littered with flowers, not placed in any particular fashion. Kei chuckled to himself and Yamaguchi joined him. Whilst Hinata and Yamaguchi laughed over the flowers in Kei and Kageyama’s hair, a loud _snap_ was heard from just beside them.

“I got it!!” an even shorter boy with odd hair yelled.

“Noyyaaaa!!” A bald boy on the other side of the court screamed, bounding over, “show me show me show me!!”

Nishinoya pulled up the picture of Kei and Kageyama with their flowers and Tanaka and Nishinoya laughed their heads off, causing Kageyama to death-glare them. Yamaguchi and Hinata then crowded around the phone, laughing at the two’s blank facial expressions.

“They look so done with the world!” Hinata laughed.

“We are,” Kei grumbled.

* * *

 

Kei admired the sunset whilst he was walking home with Yamaguchi from afternoon practise. Today’s canvas was bright orange, slowly fading into purple as the sky went up, with swirls of white from the puffy clouds floating above their heads. Stars had just started to appear in the sky, and the moon gently glimmered in the sky, waking up from a day of rest. The very tip of the sun was shining down upon the road on which Yamaguchi and Kei were walking, and Kei watched as it slowly disappeared behind the horizon, refreshing itself before returning for another day. Kei was fascinated by the sky, by the everchanging colours, watching as Mother Nature painted the day’s canvas in the sky above them.

Yamaguchi watched as Kei looked at the sky. Kei was always fascinated with the sky. When they were younger, Kei would always admire the sunsets, climbing to the top of the tallest tree to get the best view. Yamaguchi never understood why Kei loved it so much, but it slowly started to make sense to him. Kei appreciated beautiful things. And the sky was always beautiful, every night, no matter what colour.

Yamaguchi admired Kei’s face, his short blonde hair, his glasses, his eyes. His eyes were a golden colour alike to his hair, and they seemed to shine, as if he had put two lights in them so they could always glow. His face was gentle and seemed comforting, and despite his seemingly annoying personality, Yamaguchi knew Kei had a heart of gold in there. The two of them always looked out for each other.

“Do you want to get something to eat?” Kei asked Yamaguchi, finally looking down from the sky, which was now a dark purple.

“Okay,” Yamaguchi smiled, looking into Kei’s eyes. Kei smiled back.

* * *

 

Kei stared at the ceiling, watching his fan spin around and around. He appreciated the gentle breeze on his face to help him sleep. The ceiling above him had started to crack at certain places, but Kei didn’t worry about it – it was only the paint cracking.

Kei’s mind slowly drifted back to what it always arrived to whenever he was alone – his sexuality. Many sleepless nights had been spent thinking about this, worrying about it, lying in bed at 4AM wondering whether it was just in his head, whether it wasn’t true, what people would think about it. But Kei had started to become happy with who he was. He’d started to accept that part of him.

He was going to tell someone. Yamaguchi. He would have to tell Yamaguchi sometime. He knew Yamaguchi would be okay with it. Kei finally decided. He would tell Yamaguchi tomorrow. He started getting nervous just thinking about it, but Kei calmed himself down. _It will be okay,_ he told himself. _It will be okay._


	2. Midnight Moon

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hi!! thank you to people who have already read this and given it kudos. it means a lot! i hope you enjoy the rest of it ((im hoping to update every week or so, this may change because of school)).
> 
> warning that this chapter features mentions of abuse and some mentions of blood! it wasnt originally planned so i didn't put it in the tags but i feel it's important to the plot. if you want to skip it, just stop reading at "kei's father left the house when kei was 6", and start reading 2 paragraphs after that. sorry for not warning you earlier.
> 
> and as with all the others chapters, this chapter is named after an oh wonder song. you can listen to it here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gmBRRaqGYNw
> 
> i hope you enjoy this chapter!

Yamaguchi and Kei were sitting on Kei’s bed, DSs in hands, battling it out. The two of them had been perched there for the past hour – they had planned to battle at the start but Yamaguchi wanted to try and level up his Golduck until it knew Hydro Pump, and Kei let him.

When it came to Pokémon, Yamaguchi was easily the most knowledgeable on the topic – he was a complete nerd when it came to Pokémon. He had charts stuck up on his walls of how much damage different types did to others, he had dozens of Pokémon plushies and had memorised up to number 89 in the Hoenn region Pokédex. Although Yamaguchi was obsessed with Pokémon, Kei had picked up the tactics and techniques a lot quicker than Yamaguchi had, so although Yamaguchi had been playing for years before he introduced it to Kei, they were at the same level, and Yamaguchi always dragged Kei along to the different Pokémon events in their area.

“Okay Tsukki,” Yamaguchi sang when he’d finally levelled up his Golduck, “I’m ready to go!! I’m totally gonna beat your ass this time!!” After some final tweaks, Kei was also ready.

Yamaguchi started off by pulling out his Pelliper and his Golem – he knew this combination of water, flying, rock and ground could be extremely effective on most types. Kei surprised him by pulling out his Sceptile and his Walrein – not only were most of his type’s attacks not very effective against grass and water types, all of his types would have extremely effective attacks. Yamaguchi realised that he would have to use a lot of strategy to win this battle.

A few attacks into the battle, Yamaguchi realised the two of them had been dead silent.

“So, Tsukki, who’s your favourite Pokémon?” Yamaguchi asked, looking up from his DS to see Kei staring directly at his own, his brain whirring trying to figure out which move would work best.

“Like, out of my team? Or just in general,” Kei asked, still not looking up at Yamaguchi, “because that’s a very unspecific question you’re asking.”

“Okay, like, if you could have any Pokémon in your team, who would you pick?” Yamaguchi rephrased his question.

“Hmm… I’d say Dusknoir,” Kei replied, still looking at his screen. “He’s a Ghost type, which hardly any types can get an extremely effective attack on. Plus, he has really good defense and decent attack. He’d be a good Pokémon to have in the team at the end to buy time as you try and revive your old ones.”

“Not Ditto?” Yamaguchi exclaimed. “Ditto can become the same Pokémon as your partner. You can literally battle a Mewtwo once and then you’ll be pretty much invincible.”

“Dittos are overrated. Most types can’t do much damage to their own type, so it would just be a bit of a waste of space.” Kei said bluntly, sending a Leaf Storm from his Sceptile at Yamaguchi’s Golem, causing it to faint.

“Makes sense.” Yamaguchi sighed, flicking through his team to find a backup Pokémon to send out.

“How about you?” Kei asked.

“Altaria.” Yamaguchi responded instantly, like he had been waiting for the question for hours.

“Why Altaria?” Kei asked, “I mean, it’s a decent Pokémon, but still…”

“It’s cute!” Yamaguchi replied.

“You need to get your priorities straight,” Kei joked.

“I really gotta go to the bathroom,” Yamaguchi said, “this gaming has distracted me.” Yamaguchi quickly jumped up and ran off to the bathroom, and Kei heard the familiar _click_ as the door shut behind him. “Don’t touch my DS or I’ll… I’ll hurt you!” Yamaguchi yelled out in the most unthreatening tone possible.

“Oh no, I wouldn’t dare do so! I feel so threatened!” Kei joked back. With Yamaguchi gone, Kei had the time to think about what he was going to say when Yamaguchi arrived, his stomach jumping around and twisting like hell. His mum used to say this feeling was called having butterflies in your stomach. It felt more like the butterflies were doing acrobatics inside there. Kei started to run through different scenarios of what could happen in his head.

_“Hey, I’m back!” Yamaguchi laughed, sitting down on the bed, picking up his DS again._

_“Hey, Yamaguchi, wanna know a fun fact?” Kei responded, “I like boys.”_

Kei instantly pushed that idea out of his mind – there was no way he had the confidence to be able to say that, nor would it be something Kei would actually ever say in the first place. He started thinking about a different scenario.

_“Hey, I’m back!” Yamaguchi laughed, sitting down on the bed, picking up his DS again._

_“Hey, Yama-“ Just as Kei was about to talk, a giant rainbow suddenly poured into the room, coating the bare white walls in vivid colours._

_“Oh, look, Yamaguchi! The gay gods have come to tell you that I’m gay!”_

This scenario was even more unrealistic. There was no possibility that a giant rainbow would even consider coming into Kei’s room. Plus, it was theoretically impossible for a rainbow to fill an entire room. What was he even thinking? These butterflies had started to tap-dance inside his brain, and Kei was afraid they would get to the point they would start mucking up his words, and he really didn’t want to get something wrong, not with something as important as this. Before he could start running through any new scenarios in his head to try and figure out actually what the hell he should say, he heard Yamaguchi’s feet stomping down the hall. Kei wondered how such a small person would be able to create such a loud noise.

“You better not have touched my DS, Tsukkkkkiiii!” Yamaguchi sang out as he quickly walked back into Kei’s bedroom. Yamaguchi noticed that Kei didn’t look that great – his face was a weird mixture of emotions, and none of them good. “Tsukki, are you ok?”

“Uhh….” Kei murmured, the butterflies deciding to now take control of his hands, which were violently shaking. “Yamaguchi, I need to tell you something. It’s…. important.” Yamaguchi ran forward to Kei and took Kei’s hand, trying to stop it from shaking too much, which simply caused Kei’s entire body to shake. Kei tried to fight off the will to cry. He didn’t realise just how stressful this would be. He always seemed to have a bad time whenever he tried to tell anyone anything really important.

“Yamaguchi, I’m…” Kei mumbled, his head shaking as a few tears dripped out of his eyes. The butterflies were really getting into it today, and they just kept on coming. Kei felt his stomach twist and turn as his blood started to run cold, feeling as if he could throw up at any second.

“I’m gay.”

Kei managed to splutter out those two words, and with it came a tidal wave of tears, his body starting to shake. Yamaguchi simply smiled and pulled Kei into a massive hug, holding onto Kei tightly, not letting go.

“It’s okay, Tsukki. It’s okay.” Yamaguchi whispered to Kei, feeling his shoulder start to go damp as Kei cried into his shirt. Yamaguchi didn’t think differently of it. Friends were always more important than shirts. He felt as Kei slowly let go, removing his glasses to dry them on his shirt. “You know that’s okay, right? There’s nothing to feel bad about. Being gay is just as natural as feeling any other way. I still love you, Tsukki. You’re always going to be my best friend no matter what.”

Kei felt his stomach slowly start to settle as he wiped his final tears away. He started to feel insecure about Yamaguchi being so close to him – he could probably see his puffy cheeks and his red eyes. Kei always looked so ugly when he cried. But then again, there was something reassuring about Yamaguchi being that close to him, holding his hands and looking into his eyes.

“Thank you, Yamaguchi,” Kei said finally, feeling his voice choke up as he started to cry again. Yamaguchi hugged him again, gently squeezing Kei just to remind him that he was there. “I-I… I love you too.” Kei stuttered. After sitting there hugging for about a minute, Kei finally pulled away.

“Well,” Yamaguchi said, “whilst I was gone I planned out an entire battle strategy so don’t think you can take me down!”

“I’d like to see you try,” Kei laughed, his mood suddenly more elevated than ever. He felt like his entire body was floating on a giant cloud. He felt alive, finally. Like all the weights on his shoulders had been lifted. He felt free.

* * *

The next week was extremely hectic for Kei.

The night after coming out to Yamaguchi, Kei came out to his mother. Kei knew his mother would be supportive – she was very much an activist who participated in all these sorts of rallies and was the one who really taught Kei to love himself, and Kei would have been a lot more comfortable with himself and his sexuality if it hadn’t been for his father.

Kei’s father had left the house when Kei was 6, but Kei remembered him very clearly. Kei’s parents had met one night at the park – Kei’s father was very, very drunk and Kei’s mum fell for his flattery as she was extremely sensitive after recently falling out of a long-term relationship, and she started to cling onto him like he was an addiction. He would flatter her, tell her she looked pretty, tell her she was smart. And she fell for it. They got married 6 months later, and that night she’d fallen pregnant with Kei’s older brother, Akiteru. After she gave birth to Akiteru, Kei’s father started to belittle Kei’s mum. Tell her she had stretch marks and they looked ugly, that she looked like she was getting fat and she should really go on a diet. As the days went on, Kei’s father started to drink more, and a couple of years after Kei’s birth, the abuse became physical.

Kei’s only memory from before school was seeing his mum coughing up blood in the bathroom. Kei had gone to find out what was going on after hearing yelling from downstairs and left his room to hear his mum in the bathroom, and when he went to check on him she yelled at him, _screamed_ at him to leave. And he left. He didn’t know what was happening but he knew when he was 6 after his father moved out that his mum felt a lot better. But as a young child he always remembered his father’s racist, homophobic and sexist remarks he would make when watching TV, and that was embedded in his mind forever. He didn’t know if he would ever be able to shake it off.

After having her son come out to her, Kei’s mum was ecstatic. “I’m glad you found yourself and you’re comfortable with who you are!” Kei’s mum exclaimed. “I love you and you’ll always be my son.” An hour or so after dinner Kei came down to get some food to be surprised by a cake Kei’s mum had baked.

“it’s a gay-ke!” She exclaimed. “Notice the icing around the edges in different colours. I was particularly proud of that.”  Although Kei was slightly embarrassed by the cake, he still thankful for the kind gesture. Plus, his mum always made nice cakes.

The next week, Kei was sitting at his desk whilst his classmates discussed the cute girls at their school. The class were getting close to fighting over the topic – someone would throw a name in the air and the others would fight over it, declaring the girl as “theirs” despite the fact the girl probably didn’t even know they existed. Yamaguchi and Kei sat at their desks giving each other weird looks as the other boys fought, laughing at how ridiculous they were. Whilst Yamaguchi was wiggling an eyebrow at Kei, one of Kei’s classmates interrupted.

“Hey, Tsukishima~!” one boy’s voice rang out. Kei recognised it as Kirai’s voice – he was another first-year whose head was so far up his ass Kei wondered if it would ever come out. Kirai was the kind of person who’d make a joke and everyone would find it funny so he’d repeat it over and over again until people eventually grew so sick of it they had to tell him to shut up, however the girls still worshipped him for his extravagant light pink hair. “So, so, so, Tsukishima,” Kirai continued, despite picking up on Kei’s hints telling him to shut up, “what girls do you fancy? Who do you place _your_ dibs on?”

“Actually,” Kei replied calmly, “I don’t really swing that way.” Kirai’s face squeezed up like a prune in disgust and Kei had to keep himself from laughing. That would get his annoying ass out of the way for a bit. The rest of the class started talking to themselves, and someone said back to Kei, “that’s cool!” and the rest agreed. Kei could see their glaring eyes during class but he didn’t really care. That was who he was, and who gives a fuck if they don’t like that.

* * *

Afternoon training went on longer than normal, and by the time Kei and Yamaguchi were on their way home Mother Nature had painted the sky a dark grey. Spots of white had been dotted across tonight’s canvas, and the moon shone brightly, its radiating light filling the night sky with dashes of light. The horizon was a slight orange, trying to stay alive as the sunset finally died down, like a lingering aftertaste, and the darkness was almost comforting to Kei.

“Tsukkiiiii…. Earth to Tsukkkiiiiii…” Yamaguchi’s voice rang around in Kei’s head as he finally stopped admiring the stars above him and focused on what was happening around him. “I need to go this way now. Goodnight Tsukki.”

“Goodnight Yamaguchi,” Kei said, hugging him goodbye. The hug seemed to linger for longer than normal, and only when Yamaguchi moved out of the hug did Kei let go. He didn’t want to let go. He enjoyed being in Yamaguchi’s embrace, feeling Yamaguchi’s head rest on his chest, feeling Yamaguchi’s arms wrapped around his torso. The two both parted ways and Kei looked up at the sky again. The orange tint of the horizon had vanished.

After walking off, Kei heard a small ding go off from his phone. Kei fetched the phone from his pocket to see a new text from Kirai – Kei remembered adding Kirai at the start of school before realising how much of an ass he was. Kei opened the text from Kirai.

 **From:** Kirai Kodoku

_Hey faggot._

Kei felt his heart stop for a second, memories of his father yelling at the people on the screen flooding back. He shook the thoughts away and returned the phone to his pocket. As he kept walking through the dark streets he lost the feeling of calm he was feeling. He was now very much on edge.


	3. Dazzle

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> heyyooo it's another chapter!!
> 
> there's some smut in this chapter ((it's not that descriptive tho)) so just a lil warning for that. there won't be much in this story as i don't feel like comfortable writing it, but it's all rlly relevant to the plot dw.
> 
> as all the other chapters, this chapter is named after an oh wonder song! you can listen to the song here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A1EJOnYvA5Q
> 
> thank you and enjoy!

Hinata’s room was surprisingly neat, considering Hinata’s lack of organisation. His bed was sitting in the left corner, his desk on the opposite side. On his desk were the usual things – a collection of books and assignments neatly placed on the edge of the table, as well as some stationery and some old toys and figurines Hinata didn’t want to throw out. Hinata was sitting on the floor inbetween the two, a pillow underneath him and his DS in his hand, and Yamaguchi was opposite from him in the exact same stance. The two of them were in the middle of a Pokémon battle – after Kei had turned down Yamaguchi’s request to play that night as he had homework, Hinata offered that Yamaguchi slept over at his house so the two could battle.

“How are classes goin’ for you?” Hinata asked Yamaguchi, looking up at him.

“Hard. I wish I could move to your class, Class 4 is pretty awful,” Yamaguchi groaned, making eye contact with Hinata. “But I should be okay!”

“I don’t know how you manage to make it through Class 4,” Hinata mumbled, “Class 1 in itself is hard enough. How are people so smarttt?”

“It’s just about studying well and having fun!” Yamaguchi laughed.

“But studying is never fun,” Hinata complained, throwing himself dramatically across the floor, making Yamaguchi giggle.

“It’s about getting into the zone,” Yamaguchi said, “You should see Tsukki when he studies! It’s like he’s in a different world.”

“Stingyshima refuses to teach me and Kageyama after Kageyama spilt milk all over his floor the first time we visited. Pftt…” Hinata groaned.

“I’ll talk to him about it,” Yamaguchi said. “I’m sure I can get him to teach you again!”

“Speaking of Tsukishima, how’s he going after, you know…” Hinata asked.

“He’s happier than ever.” Yamaguchi exclaimed. “I know you can’t really see it on his face, but you can feel it when you’re around him. It’s like a weight has been lifted off his chest and he can finally stand up tall again. And everyone seems to be really accepting of him!”

“That’s awesome,” Hinata said, “I’m glad he’s happy. Hopefully he’ll become less of an asshole now.”

“Don’t think him being gay is gonna suddenly mean he’s all happy and rainbows and dancing and singing to the fairies,” Yamaguchi laughed, “I mean, he’s Tsukki. He’s still our Tsukki, even though he likes guys.”

“Yeah…” Hinata said, his mind wandering off somewhere.

“Are you alright?” Yamaguchi asked.

“So like…” Hinata said, his face starting to twitch and look more and more uncomfortable. “Do you, like, feel that way sometimes? Like you don’t just like girls?”

Yamaguchi was extremely surprised by the question. He’d thought about it a bit, but after Kei came out to him, he’d been thinking about it a lot more. He wasn’t too sure if he did or if he didn’t, he couldn’t tell if the feelings he had when he was around Kei were feelings of friendship or if they’d developed into something new, something more exciting, something more _romantic._

After sitting and thinking about it for a while, Yamaguchi finally responded. “I think so. I don’t know just yet but, I don’t feel like I’m just interested in girls. I don’t really know.”

“Same,” Hinata responded. “But until now, I didn’t really know who I could talk to about it, I didn’t know anyone I could, you know, experiment with, I guess…”

Yamaguchi was growing more and more nervous. The idea of being able to talk to someone other than Kei about his feelings, to have someone understand him, someone to experiment with to see what he does and doesn’t like…

“Do you want to?” Yamaguchi asked nervously, biting his lip instinctively.

“I mean….” Hinata was also growing increasingly nervous. He’d been wanting to try something like this since he started questioning his sexuality, but now the opportunity had arisen, he was suddenly worried as to what would happen. What if something went wrong?

“Okay,” Hinata said. “Yeah, I want to.” He slowly placed his DS to the side and moved closer to Yamaguchi, both of them extremely clueless as to what to do. Yamaguchi chuckled nervously to himself as he realised he was actually about to do this. He wasn’t really attracted to Hinata in any way, but he slowly closed his eyes and moved closer anyway, his lips gently pressing against Hinata’s. The kiss slowly deepened as the two slowly move their lips together, and Yamaguchi can’t help but notice that he doesn’t feel anything from the kiss. Yamaguchi placed his hands on Hinata’s shoulders and Hinata copied, their hands slowly moving down to the other’s waist, their lips gently moving, both of them unsure as to when to stop. Yamaguchi felt Hinata’s hands gently move across his stomach, and Yamaguchi slowly pulled out of the kiss, looking at Hinata.

“Did I do something wrong…?” Hinata asked, “Are you okay with this still?”

Yamaguchi slowly nodded, moving his hands to Hinata’s waist, gently squeezing. Yamaguchi could feel the erection in his pants slowly grow, and he gulped. He felt Hinata’s hands gently brush over his crotch and a shiver ran down his spine, and Hinata noticed, gently placing his hand on Yamaguchi’s crotch. Hinata looked up at Yamaguchi and smiled.

“Are you sure you’re okay? You want to do this?” Hinata said, “no one else is home. They won’t be back for a while. We can take it slow and do whatever we want. You can say no if you want, okay?” Yamaguchi nodded again, gently taking Hinata’s hands and moving them along Yamaguchi’s body. Hinata smiled and kept going slowly, and Yamaguchi felt shiver after shiver run down his spine. As Hinata kept gently rubbing Yamaguchi’s boner, Yamaguchi placed his hands on Hinata’s thighs, his fingers slowly moving up Hinata’s shorts and across his thigh. Hinata pulled Yamaguchi closer, his fingers delicately playing with the erection in Yamaguchi’s pants, and Yamaguchi closed his eyes and imagined Kei sitting there across from him, imagining Kei’s long, delicate fingers slowly finding their way into his pants.

After a while, Yamaguchi slowly pulled away. “I-I’m sorry,” he said, “I don’t know if I want to do this right now.”

“That’s okay,” Hinata responded, “do you want to continue our battle now?”

* * *

Hinata woke up hours before Yamaguchi – Hinata was a very quick sleeper, only needing a small amount of sleep to recharge before going ahead and attacking the next day. Yamaguchi, however, was an incredibly deep sleeper, and decided instead to cuddle his pillow instead of actually using it. As Hinata waited for Yamaguchi to wake up, he did pretty much everything you could do in Hinata’s room – he organised his desk, played Pokémon, stared at Yamaguchi for a bit hoping his glare alone would wake him up, made his bed, made Yamaguchi’s inflatable bed with Yamaguchi still in it (all he could really do was put the black over Yamaguchi’s body). Eventually he got so bored he decided to try and gently wake Yamaguchi up. He carefully proded Yamaguchi’s face, leaning down and whispering in Yamaguchi’s ear to wake up, but Yamaguchi didn’t flinch, prompting Hinata to simply remove Yamaguchi’s pillow and angrily whisper, “Wake up!”

All of a sudden Yamaguchi was wide awake, looking around the room with a panicked expression on his face.

“Where am I?” Yamaguchi whispered to himself, extremely panicked. He eventually laid his eyes on Hinata and calmed down, suddenly realising where he was and why he was here. His mind flashed back to the night before, Hinata’s fingers on his crotch, Hinata’s lips on his, but he pushed it away.

“i’ve been waiting agesssss for you to wake up,” Hinata groaned, “can we do something now? I’m bored.”

“Where’s my pillow?” Yamaguchi responded, still rubbing his eyes.

“Uhh, yeah well,” Hinata stammered, “I was gettin’ kinda bored so I took it from you. Yeah. Sorry about that. Can we do something now?”

“What do you suggest,” Yamaguchi groaned, shielding his eyes from the bright light on the ceiling.

“I told Kageyama and Kei to meet us at the park in about 30 minutes,” Hinata responded, “so we should probably head down there quickly!”

* * *

Kei woke up to his phone violently dinging multiple times. He reached over to his bedstand and picked up his glasses and unplugged his phone from charge to check who the messages were from.

_3 Messages from **angry redhead**_

Kei groaned. Hinata always texted him some of the dumbest stuff – whether it was a random “fact” Kageyama told him (which were never true), cat pictures or begging for Kei to help him study, Kei ignored pretty much every single one of Hinata’s texts. Kei quickly checked these messages to see what they said.

 **From:** angry redhead

_Tsukishima!!!! Meet yamaguchi, Kageyama and i in the park at 12._

**From:** angry redhead

_U better be there or else ur stingyshima_

**From:** angry redhead

_R u asleep or ignoring me??? Stingyshima_

Kei decided to respond to these texts, telling Hinata he’d be there. Kei heard his phone go off a couple of times on the text but ignored the messages – they were most likely Hinata saying he better have a smile on his face or asking for some insane request.

Kei quickly slapped on some clothes and went downstairs, grabbing a banana for breakfast and heading out the door. The flowers from the cherry blossoms had all fallen off the trees, exposing their bare branches, creating a beautiful sea of pink flowers all around the park. Kei slowly walked towards the park, knowing he was here early, admiring the rings of flowers around the trees they had fallen off of. Kei slowly walked around the park, noticing the small droplets of water on the flowers. It had rained recently, but Kei couldn’t remember when. He noticed Kageyama slowly walking along the path on the opposite side of the park, and the two made eye contact quickly before looking away. Everytime Hinata or Yamaguchi had organised the four of them meet both Kageyama and Kei would arrive first and neither of them knew how to start a conversation. After slowly walking along the path for a few minutes, Kei finally heard Hinata’s screechy voice.

“Kageyaaamaaaaa!” Hinata’s voice screeched, as Hinata ran to Kageyama to attack him, resulting in Kageyama yelling angrily at Hinata.

“Tsukki!” Yamaguchi said, walking towards Kei, his arms outstretched. Kei hugged Yamaguchi back, enjoying the comforting feeling he felt in Yamaguchi’s arms, and noticing the empty spot he felt inside when Yamaguchi let go.

“Guess what I brought!” Hinata exclaimed, holding up the small bag in his hand. Kei looked inside and saw a small black box, the lid open to reveal a stack of cards with writing on them. “It’s called Cards Against Humanity. Noya and Tanaka said it’s a really fun game!”

Kei fought the urge to laugh, wondering if Hinata even knew what the game was about. Kei had played it before with his brother Akiteru and knew just how offensive it was, and Kei had always seen Hinata as an extremely innocent person. Then again, Hinata might be hiding a more offensive side – Kei always saw Yamaguchi as innocent until the day Yamaguchi made a joke about turning uncooked spaghetti and a meatball into a ball gag.

Hinata quickly pulled out all the box and dealt out all the white cards. All of them seemed to know how to play it, as none of them asked what to do as they got their white cards. Yamaguchi giggled quietly as he looked through his cards and Kei simply smirked when he saw his own deck. Hinata placed a black card down on the grass between them.

“What would grandma find disturbing, yet oddly charming?” Hinata said, laughing as his mind ran through all the different possibilities for the question. And so the game began, Yamaguchi and Hinata laughing their heads off despite the fact that strangers walking around them were giving them extremely weird looks. After playing for about an hour, Hinata started to grow bored, so he got up and started running around, kicking the small flowers on the grass up into the air, picking up handfuls of flowers and throwing them around. Yamaguchi got up and joined him, however he was more delicate to the flowers, gently picking them up and collecting them in his hand, then tossing them into the air. Kei finally noticed the difference between Yamaguchi and Hinata he’d been trying to put his finger on for all this time – whilst they were both energetic, Hinata was more reckless, yet Yamaguchi was more delicate. Maybe that was why, despite them being so similar, Kei wasn’t the biggest fan of Hinata, yet he had grown so close to Yamaguchi.

After Hinata released the energy stored in his body by climbing multiple trees (all whilst Kageyama yelled at him to get down and if Hinata fell and died Kageyama wouldn’t go to his funeral), ran around the park and yelled out the names of every single tree or plant he saw in the area, the foursome decided to pack up and go home. After saying goodbye to each other, they all headed off, Yamaguchi and Kei walking together in the direction of their house whilst Kageyama and Hinata went their own way.

It was still daylight as the two walked home, so Mother Nature had to be conservative with her choice of decorations for today’s sky. Puffs of white clouds simply floated around in the blue abyss of the sky like pieces of cotton candy torn off and thrown into the air, a gentle breeze slowly pushing them across the canvas. The sun was hidden behind a large cloud, producing only a gentle white light which was more refreshing than hot, and the blue was calming, putting Kei at ease.

“This is my turnoff,” Yamaguchi said, “well, see you tomorrow, Tsukki!” He hugged Kei for longer than their last hug, neither of them wanting to let go. Kei felt as if Yamaguchi’s hug was tighter than normal today, and he wanted to ask if Yamaguchi was okay, but decided against it. Kei liked that tighter hold. He liked being close to Yamaguchi. The two let go after what felt like forever and Kei yet again noticed that emptiness in his chest when he couldn’t feel Yamaguchi’s gentle embrace. Yamaguchi looked up and smiled at Kei, and Kei admired Yamaguchi’s small freckles all dotting his face, like stars in the night sky. Yamaguchi slowly turned around and headed in the direction of his home, and Kei looked at the sky once again.

When Kei finally got home, he heard his phone go off. It was most likely Hinata saying what a great time he had in the park. When Kei pulled out his phone, he saw it wasn’t Hinata.

_2 messages from **Kirai**_

Kei frantically checked them even though he knew exactly what the messages would contain.

 **From:** Kirai

_You think you’re so special because you like dick, don’t you?_

**From:** Kirai

_Don’t worry, no one’s gonna like you just because you’re a bit fucked in the head._

Kei felt his heart race as he read the messages, his fingers twitching and his palms slowly growing sweaty. Kei tried to push the messages out of his head as he lay down in his bed to listen to music, but he just couldn’t. Was it true? Did no one actually like him? Was he fucked in the head? Was he wrong? He could hear the words of his father echoing in every one of Kirai’s messages, and Kei felt a shiver run down his spine.

Would Yamaguchi love anyone as worthless as him?


	4. Lose It

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hey hey hey guess what it's another chapter!!
> 
> yes, i have not updated this in months, and i have no excuses. i am sorry. i hope you enjoy this new chapter anyways, it's just really sweet and cute and fluffy and lovely and i hope you like it!!
> 
> as always, this chapter is named after an oh wonder song! you can listen to "lose it" here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VgwcPiCjQ-0
> 
> thank you and i hope you enjoy <3

Kei woke up to the sun rising, light flooding into his room through the window. Kei stretched and grabbed his glasses from the table next to his bed, putting them on and looking outside at the beautiful painting in the sky. Orange tones were splashed across the sky as if a can of paint had been dropped onto a canvas, as if the sky was drowning in orange soda. Pink spots had started to emerge from behind the orange, and blue had started to appear at the very tip of the canvas, slowly stretching out across the sky to fill it with cooler tones. Clouds dizzily travelled across the sky like a drunk wanderer, slowly moving from one side to the other, passing over the stars starting to disappear into the colour.

Kei looked from the window to his desk and saw his phone, a pain in his stomach appearing as if someone had poked him. Kei took a deep breath and got out of bed, ignoring the phone, pretending as if nothing had happened, and started to get ready for school. After quickly putting on his uniform and packing his volleyball gear he rushed out of the house, grabbing a banana on his way out. The sky had started to fade into the cool blue, and the sun’s light gently came to rest on Kei, warming his body.

Today was going to be a good day.

As he slowly walked along the path through the path he was attacked by a small boy with a head covered in red hair.

“Tsuukkiiiiiiiiiishiimmmaaaaa!” Hinata yelled, charging at Kei, head-butting his waist. Kei laughed at Hinata’s attempt to knock him over – Hinata had tried multiple times but to no success.

“Hinata,” Kei laughed, helping Hinata up after he had fallen to the ground head-butting Kei.

“You’re in a happy mood,” Hinata said, examining Kei. “You’re not the stingyshima I know. What happened? Who kidnapped you? Where did they probe you?!” Hinata started running around Kei, poking him, checking everything was as normal.

“The sky looked nice this morning. I’m feeling good.” Kei responded, smiling at Hinata.

“SooooooooooOOO,” Hinata exclaimed, stretching the _oh_ noise out as long as possible. “I have to ask you a question.”

“Fire away,” Kei said, looking down at Hinata.

“Do you like Yamaguchi?” Hinata said, peering up at Kei curiously. “Not like, you just like him, but like, you _like_ like him. Like you like him. But more than just liking, like, you like him. Do you wanna date Yamaguchi or not?” Kei was taken aback by how sudden the question seemed to appear – Kei had never truly thought about Yamaguchi in that way, and Kei was surprised someone else seemed to think Kei felt like that. Kei stumbled a little bit before regaining his composure.

“I don’t know, honestly. I think so?” Kei responded, his forehead wrinkling up as he thought.

“Ooh, the legendary Tsukishima is sharing his feelings!” Hinata laughed, “I feel so honoured.”

“I think I do,” Kei said, finally starting to settle on an answer. “I’ve never felt this way about someone before, but it could just be we’re really close friends.”

“Ohoho,” Hinata responded, “you aren’t just friends. The way you look at Yamaguchi, there’s no way you just think you’re friends.” Kei glared at Hinata and Hinata backed away slightly, afraid of Kei. As close as Hinata considered the two of them he knew Kei would not hesitate to murder Hinata if needed. That was just part of Kei’s charm.

“So…” Kei responded, trying to break the awkward silence in the conversation.

“I’m not good at motivational speeches,” Hinata said, standing upright. “That’s normally Sugawara or Daichi’s job. But I’m gonna try.” Kei sighed heavily, afraid as to what Hinata was going to say. His motivational speeches normally either ended up in a mess of words or Hinata accidently saying something along the lines of ‘give up!’ by accident (but then again, he only ever tried to give motivational speeches before competing when he was already an overload of emotions).

“You see, Kei,” Hinata said proudly, his brain piecing the words together, “life is about grabbing a hold of things. And taking it. And grabbing it. And having it. Basically, you need to push and fight for what you want! Don’t just sit back and hope that Yamaguchi will wander into your arms all ‘oooh Tsukki, I love you _so_ much and I’m so glad I confessed instead of you because you struggle with emotions!!’, you need to go and get Yamaguchi yourself! Go after what you want, don’t expect it to come to you. You wouldn’t jump up to block a spike in the complete wrong position and say ‘hey, I was expecting it to magically fly over into my hands’, you need to take things and put it into action. Yeah. Yeah!” Hinata pumped his chest with his fist, a smile crossing his face.

“Thanks, Hinata,” Kei smiled. After last night’s messages from Kirai, Kei needed something like that. Kei needed a bit of a push to keep him going. “Speaking of Yamaguchi, where is he?”

“Wow, someone isn’t up to date with their _crush_ ,” Hinata joked, feeling slightly more powerful now he knew one of Kei’s biggest secrets. “He’s sick, I stopped by his house this morning and his mum said he had an awful flu. He’s been asleep for hours.”

“Ahhh,” Kei responded. He’d noticed that Yamaguchi had been sniffling a lot the last time they were together, but didn’t think too much of it. Kei started thinking about Yamaguchi again – about his little freckles which dotted his face like stars in the galaxy, the poof of hair that could never go down. He looked up at the sky, which had now been completely enveloped in the cooling blue. He liked thinking of Yamaguchi.

* * *

Kei decided to visit Yamaguchi on his way home. As he walked, he admired the final petals left on the road from the cherry blossoms, delicately floating in the breeze as if it was having the best day of its life. Kei had a slight spring in his step too – after a day of not seeing Yamaguchi he had started to miss his energy which seemed to add a bit of colour to the bleakness of school. Kei stopped outside Yamaguchi’s house and knocked on the door, and Yamaguchi slowly walked down the stairs, his footsteps heavy.

“Helloooooo Tsukkiii,” Yamaguchi yawned, opening the door up for him. Yamaguchi was wearing a plain grey shirt and checkered boxer shorts, making it obvious he had not changed out of his pyjamas. “How was school?”

“Boring, as always,” Kei responded in his same tone, trying to hide the smile from seeing Yamaguchi again. Kei walked into Yamaguchi’s house and kicked his shoes off by the door – he had been to Yamaguchi’s house so many times now he didn’t need to ask if he could.

“I’m sick,” Yamaguchi said, stretching out every syllable, reaching his arms into the air as if to stretch.

“I can tell,” Kei laughed, walking down the hall to Yamaguchi’s room. He walked into the room and dropped his bag in the corner, Yamaguchi following behind him, still yawning and stretching.

“I’m hungry,” Yamaguchi groaned, collapsing onto his bed, starting to feel drowsy again. Yamaguchi wrapped himself up in some of the blankets on his bed and sneezed, quickly wiping his nose with a tissue.

“I’ll make you some soup then,” Kei laughed, moving out of the door.

“I don’t wanna _walk_ ,” Yamaguchi groaned, wrapping himself tighter in the cacoon he had made out of his blankets. “Can you carry me?” He looked up at Kei with puppy dog eyes jokingly, and Kei groaned, moving over to the bed to pick Yamaguchi up as if he was a baby being cradled in Kei’s arms.

“To the kitchen!” Yamaguchi yelled, as if he was charging into war, then proceeding to _boop_ Kei’s nose, making a small _boop_ noise along with it. Kei laughed, walking Yamaguchi into the kitchen and sitting him down in a chair by the kitchen table.

“What soup do you want?” Kei asked, fingering through the different instant soup packets, all with particularly unappealing names. “Cream of chicken?”

“That sounds good!” Yamaguchi responded enthusiastically, jumping a little bit in his blanket cacoon before growing tired and stopping. “How do they even cream a chicken? Do chickens have udders? Imagine a chicken with udders! Tsukki, how do they cream chickens?”

“I don’t know,” Kei responded flatly, filling up a kettle to boil to make the soup.

“Do you think they like, juice a chicken’s flesh?” Yamaguchi asked, his brain clearly working hard to figure out the answer to this question. “How does instant soup even work? How does powder just become… soup? Tsukki, how does powder become soup?”

“Because when the powder and the water mix, they become _soup_.” Kei responded, knowing that Yamaguchi was so tired he wouldn’t pick up on the lie. “It’s magic. No one truly knows how it works.”

“You sound like my mum when I was an infant,” Yamaguchi said grumpily.

“You sound like an infant,” Kei responded instantly. Shock passed over Yamaguchi’s face as if Kei had said something extremely offensive and Kei laughed, pouring the now-boiling water into a mug full of the magic soup powder. He walked over to Yamaguchi and passed him the mug with a spoon.

“Don’t burn your tongue,” Kei said, moving back to the kitchen counter to throw the rubbish from the instant soup into the bin.

“Yes, mum,” Yamaguchi groaned, stirring the soup and rolling his eyes. Yamaguchi stared at the soup for a while before turning back to Kei. “Hey Tsukki,” he said cheekily. “Can you come over here?”

“Okay, what are you planning,” Kei groaned, moving over to the kitchen bench to look at Yamaguchi, wrapped in blankets, cradling a hot cup of soup.

“Move down lower,” Yamaguchi said, grinning. Kei agreed, bobbing down to Yamaguchi’s eye level, and Yamaguchi reached out and _boop_ ed his nose again, laughing for a couple of seconds before grinning cheekily at Kei’s blank expression.

“Do you want me to confiscate your soup?” Kei said, Yamaguchi groaning in response. Kei decided to grab his phone out his bag and started walking down the hall when he heard Yamaguchi yell from the kitchen, resulting in Kei angrily running down the hall to check on him.

“What is it?” Kei said, slightly panicking. Yamaguchi looked at his soup and looked back up at Kei.

“This is incredible!” Yamaguchi exclaimed, “It’s the best thing I’ve ever tasted. It’s a true masterpiece. Frame it and put it up on a wall. It is so beautiful. Yes. I love.”

“It’s made from a packet,” Kei responded, “it tastes awful. But hey, you do you.” Yamaguchi laughed and Kei felt a small flower blossom and slowly grow inside him. Kei felt the blossom slowly crawl from his stomach out to his arms, and Kei started shaking a little bit, so he quickly sat down in front of Yamaguchi, pulling out his phone to distract him, listening to Yamaguchi loudly slurp down his soup, spilling drops on his blanket cacoon.

“I’m tiiireeedddd,” Yamaguchi groaned. “Can you carry me back to bed?” Kei unwillingly agreed, getting up off the floor and picking up Yamaguchi, gently carrying him down the hall. Yamaguchi snuggled his body into Kei’s, and Kei felt the blossom growing again, this time quicker than ever. Kei quickly placed Yamaguchi onto his bed and sat down next to him, taking quiet breaths to calm himself down. God, love was weird.

“I’m going to sleep now,” Yamaguchi informed Kei. “Goodnight.” He curled up into a small ball, hugging his pillow, wrapped up in thick blankets. Kei listened to Yamaguchi’s breath slow as he slowly started to relax, and Kei felt at ease.

“Wait,” Yamaguchi said, rolling over to face Kei. “Can you lie here with me? It will help me sleeeeppppp.” Kei felt the blossom appearing, but quickly pushed it away, slowly lying down next to Yamaguchi, feeling Yamaguchi wrap blankets around him. Yamaguchi pushed the pillow away and gently grabbed onto Kei, holding him tight as he slowly started to fall asleep. Kei watched Yamaguchi’s eyes slowly droop, his body loosening up as he drifted into sleep, pulling Kei closer to him.

Then suddenly, Yamaguchi was asleep. Kei admired his face, his delicate freckles dotted across his face, his soft lips which would feel so nice against Kei’s. Kei looked at Yamaguchi’s small poof of hair which wouldn’t flatten down. Yamaguchi used to be insecure about it but Kei loved it. Kei could stare at Yamaguchi’s face for hours and never get bored, and that is what Kei did, until he slowly started to drift into sleep as well, feeling a sense of peace.

Today was a good day.


	5. Body Gold

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hey!! it's me!! im back and im alive
> 
> first off, im so sorry for literally not updating this fic for 6 months i have zero excuses oops. the story was becoming slightly dull for me ((especially bc i planned to stretch the fic over 14 chapters!!)), however i have adjusted the plot slightly so it will now only go for 11 chapters. although it'll be shorter more will be packed into each chapter so hopefully it's more enjoyable for you and more enjoyable for me!! everybody wins yay
> 
> to say sorry for literally not updating enjoy some smut! i was going to not do any for this chapter and just have implied sex but hey yall deserve it for sticking w this fic. there is also a slight description of SH so tw for that! 
> 
> as always, this chapter is inspired by the oh wonder song "body gold". its super good and really pretty ((as are all oh wonder songs)) so i rlly recommend u listen to it! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vppNNO7nDuk
> 
> hopefully the next update will be really soon ((possibly in the next few days!!)) as at school ive now got a free lesson everyday so ive got time to waste away writing fanfiction abt fictional ppl litearlly help me
> 
> enjoy!

__Kei woke up early in the morning, before the sun had even risen. He questioned whether or not he should slide back into bed, into the warm covers which consumed him like a cocoon, a place where he felt protected. He eventually decided against getting back into bed – he could see the tiniest sliver of sun peaking up and he knew if he went back to bed now he would sleep in and miss volleyball training. He looked around his room to try and find out what had woken him – Mum didn’t seem to be up and going, she wouldn’t be at this time. The windows were shut so nothing could have happened outside and there didn’t seem to be some stranger in his room banging drums, so his eyes naturally were drawn to his phone. He had two missed texts:

**From:** Kirai

_Hey fucker, I don’t see many replies from you_

**From:** Kirai

_You too much of a sissy to respond? No wonder no one loves you – how can you protect others if you can’t even protect yourself. Fucker_

Kei’s head started spinning from the messages as he read them over and over again. Kirai had gone from insults to picking at every little bit of Kei’s personality, breaking him down brick by brick. But it was true. People rarely spoke to Kei, only Yamaguchi, and sometimes even Yamaguchi wouldn’t talk to him or would tell him how negative he was. Of course no one loved Kei, Kei repelled people who came near him, Kei was only friends with people thanks to Yamaguchi telling them to trust him and stick by him, no one truly loved Kei, did they? No one could love Kei, no one would love Kei because Kei was nothing but a fucking monster.

Kei looked down at his sharp nails, how easily they could dig into his soft flesh. Kei had read before that pain was a good remedy for sadness – if it didn’t work why would anyone be cutting themselves open? He felt every inch of his body telling him to do it, how easy it would be, how much better he would feel. Kirai’s voice echoed inside his brain, his words bouncing around, reminding Kei of how pathetic he was. Kei felt tears welling up but he held them back, remembering his father’s words, telling him to _“man up,”_ reminding him that crying was for girls, that real men don’t cry.

_Real men don’t cry,_ Kei reminded himself, ignoring the tears running down his face. _Real men fight fire with fire. Real men can take some pain._

* * *

 

“Hey, Yamaguchi,” Hinata said, turning himself to face Yamaguchi, who was sitting on the other end of the bed engrossed in his DS.

“Yeah?” Yamaguchi responded, his eyes still staring at his game. The two of them were in Hinata’s house again – the rest of the family were out shopping for school supplies which Hinata begged to get out of. Hinata’s room was slightly dark with only his bedside lamp turned on – Yamaguchi didn’t like bright lights when he was playing as he couldn’t see his screen as well. The only noise in the room until Hinata had spoken was the whirring of the DS and the gentle noise of busy roads outside.

“Can we… can we talk about the last time you came over?” Hinata said quietly, certain words dropping out. He had wanted to talk about it with Yamaguchi before now but he had never had the courage to tell Yamaguchi that he enjoyed it, that he wanted to do it again. Right after speaking Yamaguchi looked up and closed his DS, the casual conversation turned extremely intimate really quick.

“Yeah…” Yamaguchi said nervously, looking from one side of the room to the other, trying not to look directly at Hinata in an effort to make the conversation slightly more comfortable.

“Look, I….” Hinata stammered, “I liked it. I enjoyed it. I’d… I’d like to do it again.” Yamaguchi smiled at Hinata softly, slowly moving towards him.

“I… I liked it too,” Yamaguchi responded, his body starting to shake with nerves. He had been thinking about that time with Hinata, about that feeling of being close to another person, that feeling of skin touching each other so gently. Hinata moved into Yamaguchi and the two slowly moved into a small kiss, their lips brushing against each other. Yamaguchi noticed how soft Hinata’s lips were – he had always loved indulging himself in skincare and made the others jealous with how nice his skin was.

Hinata gently ran his finger along Yamaguchi’s jawline and let his soft fingers delicately move along Yamaguchi’s shirt to his waist, where they held on, pulling the two in closer. Yamaguchi struggled finding a place to put his hands, moving them from Hinata’s waist to his arms to his face, but he eventually let them rest on Hinata’s shoulders, deepening the kiss. Hinata’s arms slowly ran up Yamaguchi’s side, his gentle fingers tickling Yamaguchi’s sides making Yamaguchi smile.

This was unlike anything Hinata had ever experienced before. He had never kissed someone before now, let alone made out with them, or even further. There was something so new and thrilling about feeling another person touch you intimately, knowing there was meaning behind there, knowing those fingers had a goal. Hinata felt a rush of shivers travel across his body as Yamaguchi slowly slid his hands along Hinata’s side, gently grabbing Hinata’s shirt and lifting it off (not without it getting caught around Hinata’s arms and head and taking a moment to untangle himself from the mess), and as Hinata slowly removed Yamaguchi’s shirt and felt their bare skin connect Hinata felt a rush he had never felt in his entire life, a mixture of nerve and excitement and thrill all at the same time, taking over his whole body.

As Hinata ran his fingers all along Yamaguchi’s bare back Yamaguchi felt a shiver of pleasure run along his spine. He was unsure of what to do but being with Hinata made it so effortless – it was as if during that moment someone was reading out all the instructions to him and he knew exactly what would happen. Yamaguchi gently ran his fingers along Hinata’s front, his hand ending up underneath Hinata’s bellybutton and he could feel Hinata shivering with nerves as Yamaguchi let his hand slowly get lower.

“Are… are you okay with this?” Yamaguchi nervously said, his body gently starting to shake from the nerves of doing this. He was completely comfortable with the experience but he still felt this rush of nerves from never doing anything like this before, and as hard as he tried to hide it it wouldn’t stop. “Because I can stop if you don’t want to do this, I completely understand, this was enough for me and I’m so fine if you want to stop right now, I mean I don’t mind if you don’t want to stop but if you do that’s fine-“

“Yes,” Hinata interrupted, knowing when Yamaguchi got nervous he would often go off on long spiels expressing every one of his thoughts. “As long as you want to.” Yamaguchi nodded his head in response and Hinata smiled back at him, slowly letting his hands slide down to the top of Yamaguchi’s pants, his hands moving around to Yamaguchi’s butt and thighs, gently touching them. Yamaguchi slowly moved Hinata into his lap so the two would be at eye contact. Yamaguchi’s hands moved up Hinata’s body one more time, and then they slid down finally to his pants, where Yamaguchi slowly broke away from the kiss to unbuckle Hinata’s belt and undo his pants.

Hinata started to feel insecure as Yamaguchi gently undid his pants, sliding them down slightly to reveal Hinata’s underwear, his small bulge showing through underneath. Yamaguchi noticed the look on Hinata’s face and smiled at him, whispering to him just how beautiful he was. Hinata loosened up slightly afterwards, his arms gently resting on Yamaguchi’s side as Yamaguchi slowly touched Hinata’s crotch, as if to see how Hinata would react. The second he touched his bulge Hinata flinched, a wave of adrenaline running through his body as the thrill of what was about to happen set in. Hinata let himself be more comfortable with Yamaguchi and found his own hands sliding along Yamaguchi’s legs and up his loose pants, rubbing his inner thigh causing Yamaguchi to deeply inhale with pleasure.

Yamaguchi decided to finally make a move and let his fingers run down Hinata’s flat stomach, his fingers slipping inside the waistband of Hinata’s briefs, slowly peeling them back to reveal Hinata’s boner which flung itself out of Hinata’s underwear and slapped itself against his stomach as if it were waiting to be revealed. Hinata moaned gently now he was finally free and felt more shivers running up and down his body, the butterflies in his stomach slowly becoming angry birds. Yamaguchi smiled reassuringly at Hinata as he gently ran his fingers along Hinata’s cock, noticing Hinata’s chest slowly becoming shiny with sweat.

Hinata’s mind could think of nothing but Yamaguchi’s hand brushing against his bare cock, his body too concentrated on this one moment to do anything but breathe quickly and sharply, craving every small touch. His hands were rested by his side and he could feel himself getting closer and closer with every stroke, and he looked up at Yamaguchi, his hands gently working away as he leant in to passionately kiss Hinata, his other hand moving up and running itself down Hinata’s back to his butt. Yamaguchi had delicate fingers from playing piano all those years ago and Hinata felt as if he were a marionette puppet, and every single movement Yamaguchi made was him cutting off another string, his body falling more and more into the complete feeling of being dominated by Yamaguchi.

“I’m… I’m-“Hinata felt himself moaning, getting louder and louder as he got closer and closer, Yamaguchi bringing him in closer, working at his same gentle pace, Hinata feeling as if he were soaring higher and higher into the air until suddenly he was dropped, falling at an extreme pace, his body soaring through the air, through the darkness, moaning words Yamaguchi couldn’t understand as he came, experiencing an orgasm similar to nothing he had felt before, the intensity of it overwhelming him. Hinata felt his body shaking as he slowly came down from his natural high, and he brought Yamaguchi into a deep kiss, their near-naked bodies pressed up against each other.

Hinata eventually split up the kiss, his hands running down from Yamaguchi’s neck to his stomach, his fingers delicately unbuckling Yamaguchi’s belt and ridding him of another layer of clothing. Hinata looked at Yamaguchi and Yamaguchi nodded in consent, and Hinata gently peeled off Yamaguchi’s pants, smiling as he saw Yamaguchi’s erection peeking through his thin black briefs. Hinata noticed how sexy Yamaguchi looked, the slight sheen of sweat and the redness appearing on his cheeks, his delicate cock showing. Hinata gently rubbed Yamaguchi’s cock through his underwear, watching Yamaguchi twitch at every touch. It was finally Yamaguchi’s turn to feel the pleasure.

Hinata slowly eased off Yamaguchi’s underwear, revealing Yamaguchi’s cock. Hinata placed his hand on it, his other hand running up and down Yamaguchi’s chest, as he slowly moved up and down, feeling everyone of Yamaguchi’s movements as he twitched and shook from the pleasure. Hinata moved in to kiss Yamaguchi on the lips, then started planting kisses onto his jaw, down his neck and down his chest, moving his soft lips across his body, watching Yamaguchi’s response to each touch. Hinata finally ended up down near Yamaguchi’s cock, and he gently pushed Yamaguchi onto his back, slowly removing the end of his pants and underwear from the end of his legs, admiring Yamaguchi’s body.

Hinata kept moving his hand along Yamaguchi’s length, noticing his tip slowly starting to produce small drops of fluid, and he leant forward, slowly licking them off. Yamaguchi started to shake and moan for more and Hinata gave him what he wanted, teasing Yamaguchi with his tongue until Yamaguchi started breathing quickly, his body close. Hinata kept going until just as Yamaguchi started to moan even louder and he wrapped his mouth around Yamaguchi’s tip, letting himself catch every last drop as Yamaguchi twitched and moaned beneath him.

“Holy fuck,” Yamaguchi finally said after lying there for a couple of minutes shaking and breathing. “That… that was unreal.” Hinata slowly moved up to Yamaguchi and kissed him on the lips, then helped him up, grabbing the box of tissues and a can of deodorant to clean himself up and freshen him up a bit. Hinata smiled at Yamaguchi and hugged him after they were both fully dressed, bringing things back from sex partners to two bros just chilling and playing video games.

“I really enjoyed that,” Hinata said after the two of them had both returned to their usual spots on Hinata’s bed and their faces had started becoming less red. “I definitely… I definitely like guys. I’m sure of that now. But… I think I still like girls? Is that a thing?”

“It is,” Yamaguchi smiled. Hinata’s parents, as loving and supportive as they were, were very conservative and hence Hinata did not know much about anything other than gay and straight. “Bisexual. Two or more genders. It’s pretty neat, you’re pretty lucky to have so many people open to you.”

“I don’t know if that’s just more people open to me,” Hinata responded, “that’s just more people who can reject me.” Yamaguchi laughed a little at Hinata’s remark and slouched a bit, opening up his DS. That small joke had really helped break the ice that had formed after literally having sex.

“Well… I think I’m into guys too,” Yamaguchi said, his voice shaking slightly. It felt good to finally confess that he liked guys – he’d been thinking it for years but pushed it aside and focused more on school and volleyball, using petty tactics to try and avoid the question, but now the question was staring him right down and he had no way to jump around it except to accept it.

“I… I think I might like Kageyama?” Hinata stammered, his voice twitching as he confessed his crush. “I don’t know really but he’s… he’s angry a lot but he’s nice to me and I like him. Plus he has really soft hands and I like soft hands.” Yamaguchi smiled widely at this remark – he’d always seen Kageyama and Hinata together and thought they had some chemistry. He’d often sit offside during matches and get into wild debates in his head over who would work best with who, sometimes zoning out completely before Yachi tried to snap him back into it.

“That’s really cute,” Yamaguchi responded, smiling back at Hinata, reassuring him that he was supportive of his crush. “You guys seem really close.”

“Yeah,” Hinata said, nervously looking down. “But I don’t think Kageyama likes me. Well, I don’t know if Kageyama likes guys at all, I mean there’s already 5 queer people in the club, Yachi, Kiyoko, Stingyshima and now us two, the ratio is already madly out of whack.”

“Who knows,” Yamaguchi responded, “we’re in a fictional world, anyone can be gay if we want them to.” Hinata nodded and smiled in response to Yamaguchi’s joke.

“Is there anyone you like in the club?” Hinata asked Yamaguchi, “I mean, Noya’s pretty cute, but you might me more into someone like Tanaka.” Yamaguchi was extremely grateful that Hinata didn’t mention Kei – Yamaguchi had so many different feelings for Kei and he still didn’t know which was what and preferred to just ignore that topic for now.

“I guess Noya is cute,” Yamaguchi responded, “I don’t know if I’m that into guys like Tanaka? Maybe just for an occasional hook up.” Hinata nodded in agreement – everyone in the club could agree that whilst Tanaka did have a soft side, he was very… intense.

“I’m still sad from when the Year 3’s from last year left though,” Hinata complained. “Daichi was pretty hot.”

“Dadchi,” Yamaguchi instantly responded, bringing back the nickname all the club members used for him whenever he started to fuss over the club members after matches, making sure they were okay, giving out water.

“God I miss them all,” Hinata said, “Ennoshita’s a good captain but I’m still sad they all left…” The conversation slowly started to trail away from their previous conversation and what they just did and they started talking just like they used to.

* * *

 

“Come in!” The voice behind the door said. Kei slowly pushed it open and walked into the school counsellor’s office. It was very clean and organised and felt quite spacious despite being a small cubicle – a small seat in the corner provided a place for stressed students to rest whilst the counsellor would sit a metre away, talking to the students in her calm and easy voice. She was much younger than you would imagine a counsellor to be – she was in her early 20’s, having only graduated from university. Students around the school started spreading rumours about hooking up with the counsellor in her office, but these were quickly dismissed after she came into school with her wife.

“Welcome,” the counsellor said, a bright smile on her face beckoning Kei into the room. “Feel free to sit down in that chair there, sorry it’s a pretty small space, you’re Tsukishima Kei, I presume?” Kei nodded in agreement – he’d booked an appointment after volleyball practise about a week ago after he had cut up his hands with his nails. His fingers fiddled with the loose strands on the fingerless gloves he was wearing to conceal the injuries, however it was getting hard not to react whenever he tried to block a ball and the wound would reopen.

“So, what seems to be the problem?” The counsellor asked. Her voice was very relaxing and Kei suddenly understood why people brag about how great counselling is – the idea of telling all your problems to a complete stranger might sound unappealing but God it feels good. “Are you getting stressed with homework? Do you have a problem with teachers? Identity? I heard that you recently came out as gay, has that been a problem?”

Kei was surprised that the counsellor knew that he was gay – word obviously spreads along the grapevine quickly. Although the stem of the problem came from being bullied, Kei couldn’t help but hear his father’s voice echo in his head whenever he saw his father hitting his Mum.

_“Don’t go telling anyone, alright? No one likes a fucking dibber dobber.”_

“I’ve been getting very depressed lately,” Kei said, feeling so relieved to tell someone about his problems. “I’ve been getting anxious and stressed and I’m too worried to tell my mum because she’s a single mother and I don’t want her to have to worry about trying to look after me, and I’m afraid to tell my friends because they’re going to fuss over me.”

“I can imagine what it must be like, you’re one of the highest ranking students in second year,” the counsellor responded. “Let’s talk through what classes you have, the amount of work you’ve got. I can speak to the teachers to try and ease off the workload a bit, hopefully it’ll make things easier for you.”

The appointment ran for about an hour and they discussed nearly every part of Kei’s day that he could think of – whether or not he had breakfast, his study techniques, even how he sleeps, as she tried to learn as much about him to try and work out what was wrong. She could tell that he was hiding something but she wasn’t too sure what, and she was suspicious of his gloves, which he kept pulling up. At one point she casually referred to them and Kei lied as he had all the other times that they were important for volleyball practise and he had a note from Ennoshita about it. At the end of the appointment the counsellor wrote up a reference for a doctor that she recommended for him to see who could help him more and possibly get him on medication.

Kei ended up walking home alone – Yamaguchi had gone off early with Hinata as Kei had to stay behind for his appointment (he was “studying”, according to them). Kei felt guilty for speaking to someone about his problems, he was a man, he was meant to hold it inside, that’s what his dad taught him. He shouldn’t be going around confessing all his secrets and problems to everyone because he should be strong, he needed to be strong but he can’t and suddenly Kei could feel a tear running down his cheek and his cuts were stinging and he was squatting near the side of the road sobbing his eyes out, wishing but fearing that Yamaguchi will find him there. He slowly tried to calm his breathing down and wipe away his tears, making sure no one had seen him being weak.

As he walked down the road he finally looked up at the sky at today’s canvas – grey. The sky was grey and dull, white clouds strewn across like balls of cotton stretched out and stuck on, tiny white stars dotting the very top of the sky where the greys were the darkest. The sun leered behind the clouds at the edge of the horizon and tiny slivers of pink peeked out, but these splashes of colour were eventually concealed as the sun was swallowed up by the horizon. The sky is empty.


	6. Drive

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> yay another chapter!! these last few chapters have been a bit tedious whilst writing because the plot is p still but trust me it's gonna pick up a lot around chapter 8 and i am Very excited!!! this chapter is basically just a lot of backstory as well as setting up some of the events to come in the plot
> 
> this chapter is (as always) inspired by an oh wonder song 'drive'! you can listen to it here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_w5jPT8LMF0 
> 
> thank u for stickin w this fic and enjoy!!

Hinata and Yamaguchi sat on Yamaguchi’s small bed, their feet both dangling off the edge, with Yamaguchi lying on his back looking up at the ceiling. When Yamaguchi was younger he had been obsessed with space and everything about it and his parents had stuck glow-in-the-dark stars to his ceiling to imitate the night sky, and ten years later he still had them up there – it reminded him of when he was younger and free, when he could smile and laugh like a child, when his only problems were whether or not dinner would be nice. It felt as if high school had hit him with the brick of reality – life wasn’t all smiles and laughs, but Yamaguchi sometimes liked to lie on his back, naming the constellations and smiling like a kid again.

One night, years ago when Kei and Yamaguchi had first become friends Kei stole his mother’s eyeliner from her makeup bag and dotted all of Yamaguchi’s freckles, connecting them together like constellations as Yamaguchi named them and talked about them. When Yamaguchi’s dad came up to tell Kei his mum was there to drop off Kei’s sleeping bag he found the two of them, Yamaguchi with messy lines all over his face and Kei guiltily holding the eyeliner. They expected to be punished but the parents simply laughed and took photos of them. They had laughed all night, a massive contrast from what Yamaguchi used to do at night.

During primary school Yamaguchi was seriously bullied by two of the other kids in his class. Yamaguchi was one of the smartest in the class and always answered the questions the teacher had thrown at the cohort with pride, and these two kids, desperate to find some way to better him and feel as if they were greater picked on him for his tiny build and his freckles. The bullying went on for months and Yamaguchi would often cry himself to sleep, dotting his mum’s foundation over his freckles to try and make them go away. One day Kei caught the kids teasing Yamaguchi and threatened them causing them to run away.

“Thank…. Thank you for that,” Yamaguchi had said sheepishly, picking himself off the ground and dusting him off.

“It’s okay,” Kei responded, “I’m the tallest one in the class, most people are threatened by me.”

Yamaguchi had been afraid of Kei as well – as well as being his biggest competition when it came to grades, Kei was a head taller than most people in the class and had an older brother who was a part of the volleyball club. After Kei helped Yamaguchi he had started to become less afraid of Kei, and the two talked to each other for the rest of the day, eventually walking home together and going to Yamaguchi’s house. When Yamaguchi mentioned how much he hated his freckles Kei told him about how his freckles looked like stars, and the two of them spent the night playing connect-the-dots with Yamaguchi’s face.

Yamaguchi thought back to that moment now, his eyes moving across the stars. He could still name every constellation on his ceiling. He started to wonder whether or not Yamaguchi had liked Kei even back then – he could still remember how soft Kei’s hands felt, how delicate he was as he gently drew lines from freckle to freckle on Kei’s face. He remembered how Kei laughed. Kei loved to laugh back then. And Yamaguchi could remember how Kei hugged him before he left – neither of them had had any friends before and Kei had thought it was how people show others they care about them since his mum would always hug him. And Yamaguchi remembered enjoying the hug. A lot.

“Yamaguchi?” Hinata’s voice started to come back into Yamaguchi’s head. “Yamaguchiiiiii? Earth to Yamaguchi?”

“Yep,” Yamaguchi responded, shaking his head a little to shake himself back into reality. “Yep, hello, I’m here.”

“You really phased out just then,” Hinata said, “I kept saying your name but you didn’t even respond. I was talking to you for hours!”

“Hinata, you’ve been here for about 10 minutes,” Yamaguchi laughed, slowly sitting up and straightening out his shirt.

“What were you thinking about?” Hinata asked inquisitively, “were you thinking about your crush? Do you have a crush? Who is it?”

“Hinata, are you twelve?” Yamaguchi said, smiling.

“Anyways,” Hinata said, angrily crossing his arms to say he didn’t appreciate being called young, “I’ve been thinking about Kageyama a lot. And I think I like him. Plus lately he’s been a lot closer to me, he’s stopped getting angry at me as much, he laughs at some of my jokes now, he even hugged me the other day? He was really tired but I think I could be getting somewhere with this.”

“That’s really cool, Hinata,” Yamaguchi said, “I’m glad that you know a bit more about what you want and who you like. Does that mean that we, you know…”

“I don’t want to stop doing what we’re doing,” Hinata said, “if that’s okay? Not yet. I’m pretty sure I like Kageyama but I’d rather keep doing what we’re doing for now, it’s fun and I enjoy it a lot and I don’t know what’s gonna happen with Kageyama and I.” Yamaguchi hears his phone buzz in the corner of the room but he ignores it – it’s most likely his mum telling him she won’t be home until tomorrow afternoon again or his data company telling him he only had 5 dollars left.

“That’s fine with me,” Yamaguchi said. He slowly started moving towards Hinata, turning towards him.

“Your parents are out, right?” Hinata whispered.

“Yep,” Yamaguchi said, and he moved towards Hinata, gently pushing him down onto the bed, his hands resting on Hinata’s stomach, their lips gently connecting.

* * *

 

Kei lay alone on his bed, holding his phone above his face, praying he wouldn’t drop it on his face again. Normally Yamaguchi would be with Kei right now, enthusiastically telling Kei all about what he did that day, groaning whilst he talked about the work but smiling as he recounts some story where he met a stray cat on the side of the road and fed the cat bread. Kei was so used to hearing Yamaguchi’s voice everywhere, his sweet voice which seemed to brighten Kei’s mood. But today Yamaguchi wasn’t with Kei – Yamaguchi had separated from Kei with Hinata by his side, telling him that he and Hinata would be going to Yamaguchi’s place and wouldn’t be going home with Kei. The two had been spending more and more time together and Yamaguchi couldn’t help but feel jealous – he felt as if his best friend was being snatched right from him. He could never keep anything in his life.

Kei texted Yamaguchi asking what time he’d be done with Hinata as Kei wanted a study partner, an offer Yamaguchi would never refuse. Yamaguchi loved to study with Kei, he loved having an excuse to hang out with Kei, and Kei had an excuse to not talk as he “studied”. Kei never really did work, instead listening to Yamaguchi, but Kei struggled with talking to people, even his closest friends. Kei waited for a response from Yamaguchi for about 15 minutes until he realised that Yamaguchi wouldn’t text back, that he obviously was too focused on Hinata to text. Kei realised how dumb he was to even think that Yamaguchi would want to hang out with him – Yamaguchi would much rather talk to someone who could engage with him, someone who could match his energy compared to someone who would act as if he was unimportant. God, Yamaguchi was so important to Kei, but Kei could never express that. He was afraid to express that.

* * *

 

Hinata woke up before Yamaguchi, as usual. Yamaguchi was an extremely deep sleeper, only waking up to the sound of an alarm or if there was something particularly exciting happening the next day. Hinata crawled out of Yamaguchi’s small bed and moved over to the window to open it slightly – the light always helped Hinata wake up. It was only after opening the window to the world did Hinata realise he was wearing nothing except his underwear and he instantly recoiled, hiding behind the curtain praying no one would see him. Yamaguchi started to stir due to the light spilling out of the window and Hinata noticed that Yamaguchi was completely naked, obviously forgetting to put on any clothes after hooking up that night. Hinata slowly walked back to Yamaguchi’s bed and sat on the edge, gently poking Yamaguchi awake. Hinata couldn’t stand being the only one awake and wanted someone to talk to.

“Ughh…” Yamaguchi groaned, rubbing his eyes and stretching slightly, his senses slowly returning to him. “Hey, Hinata.”

“Hey there,” Hinata said, looking at Yamaguchi’s face. His hair was even messier than normal, spikes sticking out every which way. Yamaguchi smelt slightly due to sweating last night, and Hinata noticed he didn’t smell too great himself. “We gotta have a shower then head off to the park. We don’t have much time so shower will have to be really quick.”

“I just wanna sleep more,” Yamaguchi groaned, deciding he couldn’t be bothered trying to sit up. “Couldn’t we just shower together? We’ve already seen each other naked.” It felt so weird hearing Yamaguchi say that, and it felt weirder remembering that they had seen each other naked before, they’d touched each other naked. Every time they had hooked up it felt like some sort of dream and Hinata would forget that it actually happened. It was oddly exhilarating, the fact that he’d hooked up with someone twice now, that it was his own team member, that it was their own little secret.

Hinata finally managed to pull Yamaguchi out of bed and drag him down the hall to the shower. Hinata still felt slightly ashamed of his body as he slipped out of his briefs but Yamaguchi tried to cheer him up cracking some jokes and encouraging Hinata to get in. Luckily Yamaguchi’s shower was quite large so the two of them didn’t need to press their bodies up against each other to both fit inside and the two joked around, helping to wash each other and acting as if they were normal friends. Hinata found himself getting a slight erection at the sight of Yamaguchi naked and was about to conceal it when he noticed Yamaguchi was the same, however they didn’t have the time to do anything before they left to the park to meet up with Kageyama and Kei.

The two of them finally stepped out of the shower, the cold air outside slapping them in the face. After drying themselves off with towels they quickly got dressed, Hinata packing his bag before the two of them headed off into the outside to meet their friends. Yamaguchi quickly grabbed two muesli bars for the both of them to have for breakfast and grabbed his phone, the ‘missed text’ notification still showing. The two of them briskly walked along the path to the bench where the group normally met up.

Kageyama and Kei were already there when Yamaguchi and Hinata arrived. The two of them had been sitting in silence as they always would be whenever it was only them together and they both looked relieved that Hinata and Yamaguchi had arrived. Hinata and Kageyama called out to them, Hinata firing finger guns at Kageyama and Kei as per usual, and Hinata ran up to Kageyama.

“Heyyooooo guys!” Hinata exclaimed, dragging out the ‘heyo’ as long as possible.

“Hey asshole,” Kageyama responded, smiling at him. Yamaguchi definitely noticed something different between the two of them – although Kageyama was being his usual grumpy self there was something new – Kageyama seemed genuinely happy to see Hinata again. As Yamaguchi got closer to Kei he noticed that Kei was feeling different that day – Kei was feeling lonely. He could see it in Kei’s face, the way he slouched over slightly, his eyes darting left and right a bit to try and avoid eye contact with Yamaguchi.

“So…” Kageyama asked, looking around, “what are we actually doing? You texted us all telling us to come here, so why are we here?”

“Because I miss you guys!” Hinata exclaimed, leaning in to hug Kageyama despite knowing how much Kageyama hates hugs.

“You saw us yesterday at school,” Kei groaned, removing his glasses to wipe them clean. The coffee he had been cradling in his hands had been fogging up his glasses constantly and he was considering just taking them off and being blind.

“Ok, well,” Hinata responded, “let’s play a game! How about, uhh…” Hinata sat and thought about different games, making numerous facial expressions as he considered each game and then decided against it. Hinata’s face lit up as he finally decided on a game for the group to play. “Spin the bottle!”

Kei started to get a bit annoyed at Hinata for even suggesting that the group play Spin the Bottle. Hinata knew that Kei liked Yamaguchi and Kei didn’t know what would happen if he took it too far or if Yamaguchi was too grossed out by the idea of kissing Kei. Kei knew he would be grossed out at the idea of having to kiss someone like him. Yamaguchi was worried about playing Spin the bottle – he didn’t want Hinata to take it too far with him and accidently expose that they’d been hooking up, and he was worried what would happen if he was to kiss Kei.

“That’s an odd game for a straight guy to suggest we play,” Kageyama said, confused. Kageyama was secretly very excited to play Spin the Bottle – he’d had feelings for Hinata for a very long time, before the two of them even became that close, and the idea of possibly kissing Hinata excited him. Kageyama had initially suppressed all feelings of liking Hinata and had used anger as a way to hide his feelings, but now he had finally become more comfortable with how he felt, he had become more comfortable with the idea of being with Hinata. Hell, the thought of even hugging Hinata excited him.

Kageyama had come from a very abusive household – both of his parents would shout at him all the time whether it be for not doing his homework, not taking out the trash or simply because his parents felt like it. His parents would tell him afterwards that they do that because they loved him, and he believed them for so long. As they never hit him there was no proof that he was abused and no one suspected a thing until a neighbour heard his mother’s screams and called the police. Kageyama had been living with his uncle since he had been taken out of the house and he had never seen his parent since, but he still found himself yelling at people by accident, forgetting that he should show his affection in other ways.

The only conversation Kageyama and Kei had ever had was about their parents – it had come up randomly whilst the two of them were waiting for Hinata and Yamaguchi and they both finally found someone who they could confide in, someone who would understand their struggles and realise just how badly this abuse had changed their life. They had never addressed this conversation again but Kageyama still felt as if he had learnt more about Kei, as if the two had bonded in some odd way.

“Yeah…” Hinata said sheepishly, “I’m actually, not straight?” Hinata felt his mouth stumble along the last word, making more of a ‘sttrrr’ noise. “I’m not straight. I’m bisexual. Yeah.” Hinata knew that everyone there would be completely supportive but he still felt that fear of telling the others about one of his biggest secrets.

“That’s pretty cool,” Kageyama said, smiling at Hinata. “You’re still an asshole, though.” Kageyama was beaming on the inside – he felt like he was one step closer to finally being with Hinata, but he concealed it with his usual ‘grumpy’ persona.

“Since we’re talking about it,” Yamaguchi said sheepishly, “I’m pansexual.” It felt so relieving for Yamaguchi to finally say those words – he had talked about liking boys and girls but he had never spoken those two words, he had never truly confessed to himself that he was pansexual, but after finally saying those words it felt as if an entire anchor had been lifted off his chest.

“This is one big gayfest, isn’t it?” Kei laughed, finally looking at Yamaguchi and smiling in support. Yamaguchi felt his heart rush as Kei looked at him and smiled – Kei rarely smiled, let alone smiling at him, and Yamaguchi saw all those thoughts rushing back, the idea of the two of them sleeping in the same bed, cuddling and kissing, watching their children heading off on their first day of school, growing old and reading next to each other-

He shook off that thought before it went any longer. Kei most likely wouldn’t like him back – what are the chances of that?

 _There’s no point getting your hopes up,_ he thought to himself.

“Well uhh,” Kageyama said, “I’m gay too?” After hearing everyone else in the group confess Kageyama wasn’t as nervous about it as he would have been if he had been the first one to tell the group. He hadn’t planned on telling them today or any time soon but the time was right and there was no point keeping it from them now. Everyone in the group went around smiling at Kageyama, supporting him for coming out as the group of them tried not to start laughing from the fact that they had all just come out to each other in one big round.

“Well I have something I want to say,” Kei said, taking a deep breath in, his mouth twitching nervously. “I’m actually straight.” The laughter which the group of them had been holding in suddenly burst out and they all started to laugh, some of them only chuckling quietly to themselves (Kageyama, Kei), whilst some of them were rolling around almost crying (Hinata, Yamaguchi). Eventually they collected themselves and slowly sat up, trying to remember what they were talking about before they had all come out.

“So, Spin the Bottle,” Kageyama said, “anyone have a drink bottle or something?” Hinata instantly whipped out his small pink drink bottle from his bag as well as a textbook to spin the bottle on. The group sat around the bottle and Hinata spun first, the bottle slowly rotating to land on Kei.

“C’mon Kei,” Hinata said, puckering his lips as Kei had a disgusted look on his face, “give a nice big kiss to mama!” Kei eventually gave in, letting Hinata kiss him on the cheek. Hinata looked sad that Kei would only have a kiss on the cheek as though he had broken the rules.

“Your spin, Kei!” Hinata said, passing the bottle over to Kei. Kei lined up the drink bottle and gave it a spin, letting it slow down to land back on Hinata.

“Oh no,” Kei whispered to himself. “Once was bad enough.” Kei begrudgingly leant forward and kissed Hinata, this time on the lips making Hinata very happy.

“Now that’s how you follow the rules!” Hinata laughed. “Now it’s my spin aggaaainnn.” Hinata gave it a spin and watched as the bottle slowed down to land on Yamaguchi. Hinata smiled at Yamaguchi – the two had done this many times before but neither Kageyama nor Kei had any idea about that. Hinata leant in as he had done many times before and gave Yamaguchi a kiss on the lips, letting the kiss go for slightly longer than would be expected for friends. Kageyama scrunched up his face slightly – he didn’t like seeing Hinata kiss Yamaguchi, he didn’t like seeing Hinata kiss anyone else. His possessive trait also came from his abusive parents who told him to make sure no one takes anything that is his, telling him to fight for what he owns. Kageyama knew that Hinata was not his in the first place but he couldn’t help but feel jealous of Yamaguchi.

Kei was the most affected by the kiss. Kei noticed every little detail – he noticed the way that Hinata approached the kiss as if it was normal, like it had been done before. The way the kiss dragged on, the way their lips seemed to fit together so perfectly. Kei could tell they had done it before. Of course they had. Hinata was attractive and so was Yamaguchi. Of course Yamaguchi would find someone like Hinata, because they were clearly together and they seemed to be happy together. The pieces seemed to click into place for Kei – Yamaguchi not responding to any of his texts, the two of them spending more and more time together – they were together and Yamaguchi wanted to try and push Kei away, because Yamaguchi obviously thought that Kei liked him and Yamaguchi wanted to tell Kei to back off.

Kei quickly stood up after the kiss and muttered something about not feeling well, briskly walking off down to the path back to home. Yamaguchi didn’t notice Kei getting up but only noticed when he turned to see Kei no longer there, Hinata calling out to him, asking if he was alright. Yamaguchi thought of the missed text on his phone and quickly checked it:

 **From** : Tsukki~

_Hey,_

_when will you be done with Hinata? Would you be interested in studying or will Hinata be sleeping over. Kei._

It clicked in Yamaguchi’s mind why Kei had felt lonely, why he had left after Yamaguchi and Hinata had kissed. He’d been lonely and ignored all night, and now Yamaguchi and Hinata were kissing like they’d been dating for months. Yamaguchi stood up to follow after Kei but Kei was already too far away to catch up to, plus he had started to jog instead of just walk. Yamaguchi quickly sent a text to Kei apologising for missing his text, telling him he’d love to study with Kei that night, please text him back. Yamaguchi hoped that would be enough.

* * *

 

Once Kei had gotten out of the park and far enough away from the others he finally stopped jogging and slowed down to a gentle walk. He reminded himself as he walked about what had happened, what was happening between Yamaguchi and Hinata, he felt his phone buzz but _no don’t look at that_. His father’s voice echoed in his head, screaming at his mother about how she was lazy, how she never tried, she will never get what she wanted. He knew he will never get what he wanted. He wanted Yamaguchi.

It was cold and overcast where Kei was walking, the clouds coating the sky a dark grey, as if Mother Nature was too lazy to spend time painting the sky and just painted the canvas the same colour. Kei removed his volleyball gloves to reveal the cuts covering his hand, little scratches and scrapes. He looked at the sun, its orange tones mingling with the dark grey to show as dark red. The colour of blood.


	7. All We Do

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hi guys! 
> 
> first off, apologies for getting this chapter out much later than hoping. it was an extremely tough chapter for me to write and it took me a while, and i apologise if it feels slightly sloppy. major trigger warning for scenes of self-harm and suicide. a chapter summary will be provided at the end of this chapter, so you can scroll down there if you need. 
> 
> this chapter is inspired by "all we do" by oh wonder: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F30G87zlRPw
> 
> thank you very much for reading ♡♡

Kei wandered through the streets of his town, watching as the light in the sky just started to appear, slits of light slipping into his vision like cracked glass. It was early in the morning, much earlier than he would normally get up, and he was alone. He fiddled with his volleyball gloves, getting them into a comfortable position which wouldn’t dig up any scabs, and he kept walking, a different route to usual. The town was quiet at this moment – only small shops had opened up, old shopkeepers struggling to open the heavy doors of their small businesses which would never kick off, with the few regulars stopping buy to grab a loaf of bread before going to the bigger and cheaper supermarkets to buy what they really needed. The world had stopped caring about the smaller, more genuine things. All they cared about were cheap lies, they would rather be happy smiling next to a cardboard cut-out of someone who they admired than meet someone real. Real things were too difficult, too expensive, too complicated for human’s simple minds, Kei noted.

He walked along a rough gravel path surrounded by sweet-smelling flowers. He walked a few steps along the short path before reaching the door of the building he was going to, swinging it open and walking in, greeted by a young lady wearing all white. Kei nodded in recognition of the woman before walking down the building to the end, arriving at the counter, removing a piece of paper from his pocket and sliding it along the table, not even looking at it as if he were too ashamed of it. The man behind the counter smiled at him then walked off into a vast array of shelves covered in small boxes, each with different long labels on them. _Fentanyl. Dextroamphetamine. Benzodiazepine._ All different prescription drugs. The man finally found the box he was looking for. _Paroexetine._ It was an anti-depressant – a Selective Serotonin Reuptake Inhibitor, a drug meant to increase the amount of serotonin in his body, it was meant to make him happier. The man slid the box across the desk and Kei collected it, sliding across the money needed to pay for it and walking out the door, his head low so no one would be able to see or identify him.

He made his way back home, walking along the same path. The sun had nearly completely risen now – Yamaguchi would be awake, getting ready, probably waiting impatiently for Kei. Kei shook his head as he remembered that was no longer a thing, Yamaguchi no longer _really_ cared about him. Yamaguchi was probably having a grand time with Hinata, the two of them walking and laughing, finally matching each other’s energy levels. Probably holding hands, probably kissing, I bet Hinata sucked Yamaguchi’s dick before they left- No. Calm down, Kei. He stopped walking for a second, practised the breathing techniques his psychologist recommended for him. _Breathe in. Hold. Breathe out. Hold. Repeat._ Once Kei had finished his breathing he kept walking, putting the hood from his jumper over his head to conceal the fact his eyes were red and puffy from holding back tears.

Kei finally arrived back at his house, walking upstairs to his bathroom. He removed the box of anti-depressants from his pocket and finally had a chance to look at the packaging, reading all the warning labels. After learning what to do, what not to do and when to take the medication he opened the box, popping one of the small pills in his hand. He swallowed the pill dry – it was bad for his throat but he was used to it, it was a skill he had developed from taking so many painkillers to mask the stinging of the cuts on his hands. He grabbed the box of medication and hid it in one of the cupboards, too ashamed to look at it any longer. Then he splashed some water on his face and looked at himself in the mirror – he looked slightly fresher. No one could tell. No one would tell. This was a secret for only himself. Not that anyone else would care, anyway.

Kei heard his phone vibrate, already knowing what it would be. It would be Kirai, his only friend. The only person who even bothered to text him these days. He read it over and over again, choking up from the slurs in the message. That was him, it was as if Kirai had held up a mirror to Kei and showed him everything he was, he was those words, he was nothing but that. Nothing but a fucking failure. He hadn’t cut his nails in a while and felt his fingers creeping down his wrists as if on instinct. It was okay. It would just be once, and it made him feel better. His psychologist had told him to stop doing it, that it was harmful for him. It was just one last time. One last thing to feel better. Then the medication would wash away all his emotions and he might feel nothing but at least he won’t feel like utter shit. He let his nails dig into the skin, enjoying the sting. He could see the skin growing redder as he pushed down harder, running the jagged edge of his nails along his wrist, letting them catch on the skin, ripping it up as if it were paper. Blood formed small balls along his wrists before bursting, rolling down his skin, dripping on the white tiles on the floor. This would be the last time, he reminded himself, digging his nails in deeper, watching the blood roll along his wrists.

Kei always loved winter. Winter meant rain and rain meant sleepovers with Yamaguchi, the two of them watching the raindrops hit the window, picking raindrops and watching them race, seeing which one would get to the bottom first. They would gaze intently for hours, naming the drops, watching them slide down going every direction before drinking cups of hot and sleeping under several layers of blankets. But that was before, before Yamaguchi found other friends, friends that actually talked to Yamaguchi, friends that actually cared about Yamaguchi, friends that Yamaguchi liked. Now all Kei had were the drops of blood rolling down his wrists. Kei let them sit there, watching the blood dry, watching as the game finally ended.

This would be the last time, he reminded himself. This will be the last time.

* * *

The next day at volleyball training Hinata jumped on Kei as he walked up to the school gates, wearing his winter uniform due to the long sleeves despite it being spring. Hinata seemed happier than usual, which seemed impossible considering he was constantly a radiating beam of energy, but he did.

“Hey Tsukishima!” Hinata said, walking alongside Kei. Hinata didn’t use one of his nicknames for Kei this time – something was up.

“Hey Hinata,” Kei responded, monotone. And he wondered why no one liked him. He tried to add a small smile on the end to show his enthusiasm - he didn’t want Hinata to leave him just yet.

“Guess what happened?” Hinata said enthusiastically, as if Kei should know what happened. After Kei was silent for a small period of time Hinata realised Kei didn’t have a clue what happened and continued. “I asked Kageyama out! And he said yes!”

“That’s cool,” Kei said, trying to have a small amount of energy. But he couldn’t. He couldn’t when everyone around him seemed to be falling in love, when everyone around him seemed to be so happy. It was as if he _should_ be happy, why wasn’t he happy, what the fuck was wrong with him? And what happened with Yamaguchi? Did Hinata just flirt with him before dumping him, twisting him into believing someone actually loved him, compliments whispered across the bed being lies thrown out so Yamaguchi would just suck his dick? Why would Hinata do something like that, why would Hinata think it was okay to manipulate someone like that, Kei was trying to process a million thoughts at once but couldn’t seem to register anything, only able to mutter “I’m happy for you guys.”

“I never would have guessed it,” Hinata said, “like, he had been nicer to me lately. Still had that teasing tone but you could tell it was a joke now, and then I asked him and he hugged me and we hugged for so long! It was so romantic!”

“That sounds nice,” Kei said, his voice starting to drop down to a whisper, choking up slightly. He just wanted to hold Yamaguchi like that, he just wanted to hold him so tight, tell him how much he loved Yamaguchi, _God_ he loved Yamaguchi. But he’d never be able to, he knew that much. Unless something was to magically happen that day Kei knew he would never be able to tell Yamaguchi how much he loved him himself, and words could only do so much. Words can’t express what a kiss feels like. “I need to stop off at the shops.”

“Okay!” Hinata said, turning the opposite direction of where Kei was heading, on his way to school. “I’ll see you at volleyball training!” Hinata bounced off into the distance, towards his happy place, a court with his boyfriend and people who cared about him. Once Hinata was far enough away Kei spun around, making his way back to his house.

* * *

Kei was home now, dropping his school bag off near the door. He made his way to his bedroom, picking up a pen and a notepad, moving into the bathroom. Every step seemed to be heavy, he knew exactly what he was going to do, he had thought over this all night, even dreamt about it but it still felt so foreign.

He moved into the bathroom, sitting down on the toilet, his notepad in his lap and the pen in his hand. The second he moved his hand to the piece of paper the response was automatic, it was as if every single one of Kei’s thoughts spilt out onto the page, like a dam cracked open, the words flowing like water, desperate to move, to be seen.

_To all the people addressed in this letter,_

_I apologise if this letter feels odd. I’ve never written one before, it’s not exactly something they teach you how to do in English class, is it? You’d imagine in a society so driven by death, one where we make suicide seem like a dream, where every story is kill yourself or be killed by the people at your school, you’d imagine that they’d at least talk about this. Or, more specifically, not to do it._

_If you’re reading this letter,_ Kei’s hand started to shake – he knew what words he had to write but he couldn’t bring himself to write it. _I’m dead. I’m no longer in this world anymore. It’s weird, right? I have no clue right now what death will feel like – will it be like Heaven? Will God welcome me with open arms, or will he beat me like the boys in my school? Will it just be black? Will I even feel or remember anything, would I simply be consumed by a never-ending void, feeling nothing, knowing nothing, not even being? Whatever it is, I’m feeling it right now. The prospect is terrifying but somehow I trust it will feel better than this._

_This world is empty to me. It means nothing, no one means anything to me anymore. It feels as if I have lost all connections in this world, every single place I used to love and trust has been torn out of me. This place feels so alien to me, every day feels like I am in a foreign location with strangers who talk to me as if we have been friends for years. We have but it’s stopped feeling like that. I feel as if I’m a stranger to my own body, and I’m a stranger to my world. And I hope that dying might finally bring me back to my body – if we both go, at least I’ll finally feel connected._

_To my mum: I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. This was not about you, you did everything you could have, I would have been dead years ago if it wasn’t for your love and support. You shouldn’t have to go through this, no fucking way should you lose someone you love, but you have to. It’s what is best for me, I’m going to be so much happier if I can’t feel anything at all. You were the only thing that could keep me grounded to this Earth._

_When I was 8 you took me to the zoo. I was so fascinated but I got so sad when I found out there were no dinosaurs, I begged you to show me a dinosaur zoo, you promised me one day you would build something like that for me, my own little dinosaur zoo, a safe place for me to run around and celebrate. You built that for me with your smile, with the beautiful things you would do for me, when you made me a rainbow cake after I came out to you. I felt so safe around you._

_To Yamaguchi: I love you. I love you so much. All I ever wanted to do was hold you, to kiss you and tell you beautiful things, to make you smile. You made me feel so warm, whenever I was with you I felt that maybe everything would be okay. I’m so sorry I could never tell you this, I’m so sorry I could never hold you close like I always wanted to. I hope, if there is such thing as Heaven, if there is a God and he’s just a fucking awful person for letting people go through the shit I did, I hope I can see you again and we can hold hands and watch the cherry blossoms._

_To my team: I hope you find a new middle blocker. I’m sorry I had to abandon the team like this but, I wasn’t that important. I’m sure you will all be okay. Thank you for making me feel safe and comfortable when you did. It means a lot._

_To Kirai. I guess you finally got what you wanted. Thank you for keeping me up late at night, constantly making me doubt myself, making me feel as if I were pointless. As badly as I want to hate you I can’t – you held the mirror up to my face, you made me realise who I was, you made me realise how others thought of me. So I guess I have you to thank for that._

_I don’t care what you do with my possessions. Send them off to charity, keep them for yourself as a momento. I won’t care when I’m dead, anyway. In the end they’re all pointless possessions, novelties we love and cherish until they are replaced with new and improved memories of loved ones, of ourselves. But in the end, the Earth is going to be demolished, and we’re all going to be dead, won’t it? We will no longer remember these pointless possessions. So why bother trying to give unnecessary demands, putting more stress on the people who have to do this work. Just get rid of them, somehow._

_I don’t want a funeral. I don’t want anything lavish, I don’t want people to cry over me. My organ donor card has been attached to this letter, use that to make sure my body can actually go to something. Then cremate me, do whatever the fuck you want with the ashes. I don’t care anymore._

_Just promise me one thing. Don’t cry over me. Don’t get emotional thinking about me, don’t wish you could have changed things, because you can’t now, can you? It’s too late now and I’m dead and you need to move on. You’re sad. Big deal. Being sad won’t get you further in life. Go ahead and do what you want with your life. That’s what I’ve done._

_I don’t know how to sign this letter off, so I’ll just say thank you for reading this. And sorry._

_Tsukishima Kei_

Kei didn’t realise he was crying until he finished writing, the tears streaming down his face, droplets hitting the page. He moved his finger up to touch the tears, tasting it. It was salty. He enjoyed the sensation of taste one last time, tasting his tears once more.

Then he looked at the bright light, the way the light seemed to flare if he squinted slightly at it, the white dot that would stay in his vision even after looking away, the gentle headache he got whilst staring at the light.

He ran his fingers along his skin, along his scabbed cuts. He felt every small bump, the way his skin got rough around his scabs, the contrast between smooth and rough. The way his veins seemed to stick out from his wrist, pulsing with blood he was about to spill.

He enjoyed the delicate lavender scent of the room one last time, breathing it in. It was relaxing and sleepy, calming him. He felt his heartrate slow down slightly. Death no longer terrified him.

Kei wrote a second note in bigger letters.

_Don’t open the door. Call the police. I’m sorry._

He stood up, sticking it to the bathroom door on the outside for his mum to see. He didn’t want her to have to go through seeing his dead body in the bathtub, drained of blood.

He stepped out of his clothes, moving over to turn on the taps for the bathtub. He looked at himself in the mirror. This was him. He was about to die.

The bathtub was full. He stepped in. The water felt comforting around him. It held him, gently rocking him to sleep.

He had a razor in his hand. He pressed it against his finger. Sharp. The sting was familiar.

He looked around in the white bathroom.

He smelt the room. This is my bathroom. Mine. Me.

My skin, he thought, running his fingers across his wrists.

And suddenly he started sobbing uncontrollably, rocking in the water, letting it spill out of the tub. He cried for who knows long, everything rushing through his head, the memories of everyone and everything, everything he seemed to know, everything he loved, everything that was his. His. Bathroom. Bedroom. His. It was all his, it was for him, it was his place on this Earth, he was connected to this world. He belonged.

And Kei pulled himself out of the bathtub, taking a towel nearby and drying himself off. He looked at himself in the mirror, his naked body. Those moles were his, this hair was his, his stomach, his chest, his legs, his penis, everything was his. He had a body, he was in that body. He opened up the door and removed the sign from it, grateful his mother hadn’t gotten home just yet. And he dried himself off, stepping back into his school uniform. He reached over for the note he had written, folding it up neatly, sliding it into his pocket. He wouldn’t need it. Yet.

He looked out the window at the sky. It was a gentle wash of blue, no clouds, no imperfections. Simply blue. And Kei let the sky sweep him away, sweeping away his flaws, his insecurities, until he felt nothing but softness. He looked at himself once more in the mirror.

I am Kei, he told himself. And I exist. And that is beautiful.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> chapter summary: 
> 
> Kei visits the doctor early in the morning and the doctor gives him a prescription for anti-depressants. When he gets home he hides them inside his bathroom, wanting to try and hide the shame of needing medication to feel better. At home he reads more texts from Kirai and finds himself self-harming again. At volleyball practise Hinata proudly exclaims he confessed to Kageyama and the two are now dating and Kei congratulates him. Hinata and Kei walk to school and Hinata talks on and on about their relationship, and Kei feels so alone. Kei turns around halfway, making his way back home. When he gets home Kei starts to draft a suicide note – he writes to Yamaguchi, telling him how much he loved him, to his team members, to his mum, telling her it wasn’t her fault, it was his. He finally finishes and decides against it, folding the note up and putting it away.


	8. Technicolor Beat

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> me, updating incredibly irregularly? its more likely than you think
> 
> finally posting another chapter! thank u to all who have somehow managed to stick around throughout all these irregular updates - im p sure i started this fic over a year ago and it's yet to be finished oops. anyways this is like kind of cute and fluffy but also kind of not? anyways i hope u enjoy it yay. tw for mentions of self harm and panic attacks. 
> 
> this chapter is very loosely based off "technicolor beat" by oh wonder - you can listen to it here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j9FfYWp_d5w

“Yamaguchi!” Hinata shouted out, seeing Yamaguchi in the distance, the two of them both at school. Hinata had been running around the school grounds for the entire day, trying to find his friends and tell them about his relationship with Kageyama. He had written a list in his head of people who he needed to tell and crossed them off as he went. He’d told Kei, Nishinoya, Koshi and Sawamura that day, and as practise wasn’t until the afternoon he wanted to see how many team mates he could tell before training.

“Hey, Hinata!” Yamaguchi smiled after hearing Hinata calling out for him. “Have you seen Tsukki today?”

“Yeah!” Hinata responded, a giant smile plastered on his face. “I saw him this morning! He seemed pretty off, actually, then he had to go to the shops. He might just be skipping school!”

“That’s odd,” Yamaguchi noted. Kei had never skipped school before, he never would – he was one of the few people who legitimately enjoyed school, the structure, the teachers, all the content he learned – it was extremely unlikely for Kei to skip. Yamaguchi took note to text Kei where he was after he and Hinata had stopped talking.

Yamaguchi made his way to his next class, wishing he could speak to Hinata more about Kei’s behaviour. Kei had been so detached lately – he seemed so uninterested in everything, and not in his usual ‘tsukki’ way – even things he enjoyed doing he didn’t seem to enjoy them anymore. Yamaguchi didn’t know how to talk to Kei about this, he didn’t know if Kei even had a problem or if Yamaguchi was just overthinking things. He quickly pulled out his phone to text Kei:

 **To:** tsukki~

Hey, where are you? Thought you’d be at school. Please text me back.

Yamaguchi tucked his phone back into his pocket, walking into his class slightly late, apologising to the teacher before hurrying into his seat. Kei’s usual seat right next to him was completely empty, and Yamaguchi kept his phone in his lap, making sure he could see if he got a response.

* * *

 

Kei had been lying in bed for a few hours attempting to rest before he received a text, recognising Yamaguchi’s tone instantly. Kei reached for it, taking it off his nightstand and reading Yamaguchi’s message. He considered not responding for a while, simply resting, relaxing and being invisible for a day, before he decided to reply. He didn’t want Yamaguchi to get worried about him.

 **To:** yamaguchi

Not coming to school today. Sick.

Kei received a response almost instantly from Yamaguchi.

 **From:** yamaguchi

Can I sleep over tonight?

Kei thought over it for a while – as badly as Kei wanted to take a day off, a day of not having to interact with anyone, just resting and relaxing and doing whatever he wanted, he didn’t want to turn down Yamaguchi, especially since they’d become slightly distant lately.

 **To:** yamaguchi

Sure.

Kei checked the time – 12:34pm. He still had about five hours until Yamaguchi would be at his place, so he set himself an alarm to go off in four hours, pulling himself under the covers of his bed to try and rest, calming his thoughts. He was worried about everything – about Yamaguchi, if he wanted to come over just to cuss him out or something, worried that they would become more disconnected, that Yamaguchi would sense something was wrong with Kei. Kei finally drifted off to sleep, but the sleep was light and Kei woke up with a bad taste in his mouth.

Kei pulled himself lazily out of bed, checking his phone to see no missed notifications – at least Kirai had disappeared for a bit. Kei stood up and moved over to his wardrobe, pulling out a decent hoodie and jeans and a pair of underwear. He had been completely naked the past four hours, too lazy to dress himself after stripping himself of his wet clothes from going into the bathtub. He looked at himself in the mirror, re-establishing himself, trying to re-associate. He told his brain to lift up his left arm, watching himself in the mirror as his left arm slowly lifted up. He told his brain to lift up his right arm, watching himself in the mirror as his right arm slowly lifted up. He told himself to move his fingers, one at a time. It was around ten minutes until he finally felt as if the limbs he saw were truly his.

 He tidied up his hair slightly and sprayed on some deodorant before stepping out of his room, moving to the bathroom. He hesitated slightly, worried to enter in case it would trigger memories of earlier, before stepping inside. It looked normal – he had cleaned up any evidence of what had happened earlier, and he walked over to the sink, splashing his face with cold water to wake himself up.

Kei finally moved down into the main room, where the kitchen, dining room and living room had all merged into one open area. He planted himself on the couch and turned on the television, trying to distract himself before Yamaguchi arrived, unsure of what would happen. The last time Kei had seen Yamaguchi was the other day when Yamaguchi kissed Hinata at the park and who knew how Yamaguchi felt about Kei after that.

Kei heard a knock on the door and got up off the sofa, moving over to open it, seeing Yamaguchi’s face peering through the window.

“Hey Tsukki,” Yamaguchi said, moving in to hug Kei gently and quickly. “You feeling any better now?” Kei flinched for a moment, confused as to what Yamaguchi was talking about, before remembering that Kei was meant to be sick.

“Yeah,” Kei said in response, fake coughing slightly. “I’m much better now. Just needed some time to rest.”

“Do you want anything?” Yamaguchi asked, acting in the role of the mother whilst Kei was the secluded teenager. “I can make you something to eat if you need?”

“I’m fine,” Kei said, appreciating the gesture. Kei was still tired – it had been a long day for him emotionally, even though it was only 4PM, and he had only just woken up earlier. “Do you need anything?”

“I’m fine,” Yamaguchi said, smiling back. Kei was sure that smile was what kept the Earth spinning. It was so full of energy and life that Kei almost couldn’t take it. “Do you wanna watch a movie?” Yamaguchi didn’t wait for Kei to respond, moving forward to the cabinet which held all the DVDs. Yamaguchi darted his eyes across the titles before he finally found the one he’d been seeking out, pulling it out to show Kei triumphantly.

“You know me too well,” Kei chuckled to himself, as Yamaguchi slid the movie into the DVD player. After taking a few seconds to load the title screen appeared, ‘JURASSIC PARK’ printed in bold letters over the screen. This was Kei’s comfort movie. He knew everything about everything when it came to this movie – the actors, the shots, the trivia. It was a weird movie to call a ‘comfort movie’ but Kei didn’t mind, and this wouldn’t be the first time he’d subjected Yamaguchi to sitting through it.

Yamaguchi was horrendous at talking during movies, especially during ones he’d seen before. Even though the movie had already started he was treating it like background noise, engaging in small talk with Kei, catching him up on the latest events at school.

“Hinata and Kageyama are dating,” Yamaguchi said, standing up and moving to the kitchen, trying to find any kind of sweet food he could snack on. “Hinata told me this morning.”

“Finally,” Kei replied. “Those two have been filling the air with sexual tension, it was almost too much to handle. I’m surprised they were both dumb enough to not notice.”

“I’m glad they got together,” Yamaguchi said, pulling out a tub of ice cream from the fridge. “I’m happy for them. It’d be nice, wouldn’t it?”

“What would be nice?” Kei didn’t want to talk about this. Unrequited love was difficult enough to deal with – he didn’t want to have to deal with discussing love with the person who didn’t love him back.

“Being in a happy, stable relationship. Having someone you can always turn to, someone you can trust with all your heart. Someone who can smile at you and tell you things will be okay and for a minute, no matter how bad things are, you believe them. Someone who makes your heart open up like a tulip at sunrise.” Yamaguchi had stopped now. There were a hundred and one thoughts running through his head at that moment and every single one involved him and Kei.

“That terrifies me,” was Kei’s only response.

“Because you’re afraid of being vulnerable.”

Kei didn’t know how to respond to that, so he stayed quiet. The conversation hit a patch of silence, neither of them wanting to keep on talking about this but neither of them knowing how to change the conversation. Finally Yamaguchi snapped back into reality, grabbing two spoons and moving over to sit in front of the couch that Kei was lying on, carrying the ice cream tub with him.

Yamaguchi passed a spoon to Kei, Kei instinctively reaching out with the arm closest to Yamaguchi – the arm with the cuts.

“What are those?” Yamaguchi asked, pointing them out.

Kei instantly recoiled, hiding his hand up his long sleeve. “I tripped and fell,” he lied. “Grazed my hand.”

“Grazes don’t make straight lines,” Yamaguchi replied instantly, taking Kei’s hand and holding it tight. He put more force into the same question he had just asked. “What are those?”

Kei didn’t know what to do. He shut down internally as panic set in, not wanting Yamaguchi to know of his vulnerability but having nothing else to do or say. He was out of excuses, not that any excuse would work. He knew Yamaguchi knew what those cuts were. But Kei couldn’t say it, he was too afraid to say it. He could feel his breath quickening and his chest squeezing tight. Yamaguchi had wrapped a snake around his lungs and it was constricting him, cutting off all his oxygen. He could hear something from outside. As if he were trapped in a glass dome. He knew someone was saying something, Yamaguchi was saying something, but he couldn’t make out the words. But he kept listening to Yamaguchi’s voice. Yamaguchi was taming the snake and he could finally begin to breathe again. Oxygen never tasted so sickly sweet.

Kei could finally make out the words Yamaguchi was saying. “It’s okay,” he was repeating, over and over again, his arms wrapped around Kei, holding him close whilst Kei was in the fetal position. “Listen to me, Kei. I’m here. You’re here. We’re here. You’re going to be okay.” Yamaguchi’s voice sounded like butterscotch against the harshness of the outside noises of the world.

Kei blinked a couple of times and looked around, regaining vision and hearing, re-establishing himself. At some point during his panic attack Yamaguchi had turned the television off but Kei couldn’t remember when. He had no clue how much time had passed.

“You’re going to be fine, okay?” Yamaguchi told Kei, gently running his fingers up and down Kei’s back. It was something Yamaguchi remembered Kei’s mother doing to Kei whenever he got stressed, and he hoped it would help out now. “Look at me, Kei. You’re with me. We’re going to be fine. Things might be hard now but I’m going to be here with you. We’ll fight through it together.” Yamaguchi ran his hands along Kei’s arms and interlocked his fingers with Kei’s. He held them there and looked into Kei’s eyes. Yamaguchi knew nothing he could say would immediately fix Kei. If there were magic words that would cure Kei’s anxiety Yamaguchi would repeat them until his throat was dry and his vocal cords could stand no more, and even then that wouldn’t stop him. Kei meant everything to Yamaguchi, and Yamaguchi would not let that go, no matter what happened.

“Do you need anything?” Yamaguchi asked Kei, their fingers still interlocked. Kei enjoyed that feeling. It made him feel warm. He felt loved.

“I’m okay,” Kei replied. When he realised that answer didn’t satisfy Yamaguchi, he mumbled quietly to himself. “I wouldn’t mind some water.”

Yamaguchi flung himself off the couch, nearly running to the kitchen to get Kei a glass of water. He grabbed a glass, filled it up and moved back to Kei, handing it over. “If you need anything else, let me know, okay? No matter what time it is, even if you think it’s dumb and unimportant.”

“Thank you,” Kei said, smiling for the first time that day. Kei sipped his water and lay down on the couch, Yamaguchi following him. The two lay there for what felt like forever. Kei admired Yamaguchi’s back and began delicately running his finger along it. The two of them had a game they would play as children – they would draw on each other’s bare backs with their fingertips, and the other would have to guess what they were drawing.

Kei gently lifted the back of Yamaguchi’s shirt and softly ran his fingertip along his back. He traced out a long curve, topped with two dots.

“A smiley face,” Yamaguchi guessed, remembering the game very well.

“Correct,” Kei said. He let his finger run along Yamaguchi’s back, from his right shoulder blade, down to the small of his back, arched up to his other shoulder blade and then back to the start. He drew three small spikes on top of the shape and filled the shape with small dots, all marked out with the touch of his finger. Yamaguchi thought hard but ended up pulling a blank.

“Strawberry,” Kei answered, teasing Yamaguchi slightly for getting it wrong.

“Okay, my turn now,” Yamaguchi said, rolling over to face Kei. Kei rolled over himself and gently lifted his shirt up for Yamaguchi to draw on it. It felt nice, this escape from adulthood, from the realities of now. Although they could never truly return to their childhood, back when they were happy, Kei didn’t mind trying.

The last thing he could remember was trying to draw a porcupine on Yamaguchi’s back before he fell asleep.

* * *

 

Kei woke up to darkness outside. Yamaguchi was gone from his bed and he felt uncomfortably empty - he wondered if Yamaguchi had snuck off during the night, not wanting to have to deal with Kei anymore. Kei was about to begin panicking until he heard Yamaguchi humming to himself in the kitchen, signing some obnoxious Western song.

“You know I hate that song,” Kei groaned, wanting Yamaguchi to stop singing.

“Morning, sleepyhead,” Yamaguchi teased, dancing around the kitchen, still singing. “It’s about 3AM right now. Going to bed at 5PM really threw out our sleeping schedule. You want breakfast?”

Kei couldn’t understand how Yamaguchi could be making breakfast at a time like this, but it honestly didn’t surprise him at this point. “What are you making?”

“Waffles,” Yamaguchi said brightly, “your favourite. You had no waffles in the cupboard so I’m making them from scratch. I had to improvise with a few ingredients but it should be fine!” Yamaguchi’s cooking was always very hit or miss. Sometimes he would produce the most amazing food with seemingly no ingredients. Other times he would lose control and end up eating pizza covered in ketchup instead of using actual sauce.

Kei yawned and stretched his arms, getting up and making his way down to the kitchen. Kei wanted to help out with the food but he wanted control too bad – Kei preferred baking alone and sticking to a recipe, whereas Yamaguchi thought recipes were for people who weren’t smart enough to improvise. The two of them didn’t work well together in the kitchen.

“Sit,” Yamaguchi said, gesturing at the table, “your waffles are almost ready. I wanted to treat you.” Yamaguchi removed the food from the waffle iron and slapped it on a plate, going a bit overboard with a can of whipped cream and covering it in fresh fruit and maple syrup. Yamaguchi carried the plate over, balancing it on one hand, and placed it in front of Kei. “Your breakfast is served,” he delivered, in an obnoxious French accent which bordered on sounding Russian.

Kei smiled at the food and Yamaguchi’s voice. He knew how hard Yamaguchi was trying to make him feel better and he appreciated it, even though he was bad at expressing those feelings. “Thank you,” Kei replied, “really.”

Yamaguchi prepared his own plate and made his way down to the table, wasting no time digging in to his food. Kei was so focused on eating himself that he didn’t notice as Yamaguchi watched him, picking up on all the little quirks that made Kei so special to him. The way he ate, picking up his fork in the wrong way, something his mum always grilled him on. How he tapped his foot against the floor if he had nothing to fidget with. And finally, his smile. Kei never fully smiled, only turned the corners of his mouth up slightly. In a world of black and white effervescent colour danced around Kei’s lips whenever he smiled, as if it were all built up inside of him, just waiting to escape.

It was at this moment that Yamaguchi realised he was in love with Tsukishima Kei, the blonde boy who rescued him from bullies long ago. The boy who he always played volleyball with, who used to have the most infectious smile. The boy who lost his smile when the real world finally learnt his name. And it was at this moment that Yamaguchi realised he would do whatever it took to find this boy’s lost smile.

 


End file.
